He's going to City to replace another leader, Kompany.
Matthijs de Ligt / signs for Juventus, lowering their average age to 56
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It has, that player ended up being our top contributor towards goals this season, whilst playing in MF.
Could do with a few more others like him.
That player has been miles below expectations. Crap most of the time.
We should hope that Barca do sign him, because otherwise it's going to be Liverpool/City.
Or Juve
That player had slumps, but if all his passes were taken by strikers who can score, you would have another tune.
Juve/Bayern/PSG, I could live with. But City will definitely be in the market for a CB and Liverpool will struggle to resist the urge to partner up the Netherlands' first choice CB pair.
Not to mention that if he signs and the club isn’t back to where we want to be challenging in 2-3 seasons he’ll still only be 23, with another 10 years of playing at the highest level to look forward to, form and injury permitting if he wants to go elsewhere. I really hope if we’re in for him we’re selling him on the prospect of our restoration to former glory, because I do think that’s a strong narrative to sell to a young player.
Could be the foundation of years of success. Going to Barcelona where they seem to have a bottomless pit of cash though
Exactly: Rio, £30M from Leeds, 2002 (17 years ago). At the time many accused of us of getting seen off.
what @diarm said is true, this would be extremely similar to the Rooney signing. Undoubtedly the most talented youngster out there, just being CB is far less fashionable. I sadly have hope we might have a chance and it's the hope that kills you!
So true. All talk of a club in crisis would instantly be gone in my opinion. Lots of other quality players would see us as a very attracting option.
Ole said he wanted to model his transfer strategy on Rooney & Ronaldo... young, with the ability to make a difference now, but with the potential to be generational talents (if they apply themselves and get a bit of luck with injuries).
De Ligt is one of very few players in that bracket. Pay the money & build a team around him. I'd like to think agents Blind & Van der Saar would put in a good word for us too.
Yes, I understand that Barcelona would happily take him, but seem to be prioritising their money elsewhere. We need to show him how much we would value him here.
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Sorry @diarm - just saw your post, had no intention of just duplicating what you said!
De Ligt is one of very few players in that bracket. Pay the money & build a team around him. I'd like to think agents Blind & Van der Saar would put in a good word for us too.
Yes, I understand that Barcelona would happily take him, but seem to be prioritising their money elsewhere. We need to show him how much we would value him here.
Edit:
Sorry @diarm - just saw your post, had no intention of just duplicating what you said!
I was already all in on this one, but feck it I’m so in now that I don’t even now where in actually began.
Believe fellow Kermits
Believe fellow Kermits
I believe they have some serious financial problems, need to pay wages with borrowed money
Reports from the Spanish press say Barcelona have ‘lost control’ of the situation and that they’ve basically messed this transfer up. Wouldn’t not be surprised if they already have this transfer wrapped up and the media have been fed this story by Bartomeu and his team so when they do sign him it’ll make him look a genius.
It would be a huge statement of intent.
Jadon, felix, werner and De ligt fit that criteria (young talent with insane talent). AWB, Zaniolo and pellegrini are a step behind.
feck sake, where’ve you popped back up from? I was hoping you’d stay inactive so I could nick your username.
Kidding. Also not kidding.
We all cry about players messing up our wage structure like Sanchez, but yet in order to pull this deal off we'd have to offer stupid money to a 19 year old. Let's say we sign him and blow other people out the water because frankly there would be no other way he'd choose us over the opposition. What happens in a few years when it's time to re-new? Massive bumper deal again? He's be 22, then what happens in another 5 years? Talk about messing up our wage structure....This guy is great, I'd love him here, but we need to stop throwing money at players and making them choose us for the dosh, rather than actually wanting to play for us imo
Ahhh, Mr. LennonNL I suppose!?
No, I was always around but read more than post
Sorry for offtopic
Dude the days has long gone where a top talent will join us over other top clubs just for history and love.
The problem is that you're always aiming for the most shiny toy available when there's loads of other players out there which would cost half of De Ligt's fee, who'd actually want to play for United and who would also instantly improve your starting XI, probably quite a lot at that.
The players who started Liverpool's transformation were the best player of a mid-table PL side, Hoffenheim's striker and a winger from AS Roma who had a good, not great season. You obviously need some luck as well but it's just not necessary to buy the biggest, greatest, bestest talent out there every summer. If I'm not mistaken, Chelsea opted out of the Shaw deal because of his insane wage demands and I don't think they've regretted it for a second ever since, even though he looked like a world beater at Soton aged 18.
The issue honestly isn't that we are playing top talent insane money, it's that we are paying huge money for good players, and big money for ordinary ones. Look at our marketing since Ed took over... now imagine if we had a team like we did in '99 or '08... how much money could Ed make us? It's all about percentages.
Interesting list, I'm assuming that you've left out people like Mbappe and De Jong because they're not available.
Yeah... got it changed as it'd be pretty easy to identify me if anyone knew my name on here!Ahhh, Mr. LennonNL I suppose!?
No, I was always around but read more than post
Sorry for offtopic
If Ed makes this happen he will be back in the good books..
It pains me to agree with a Liverpool fan about anything, but you are spot on. People complain about how we have inflated our wage structure, and about how football transfer fees are broken, but we are a part of the problem if we acquiesce to insane agent fees, player wage demands, and overpriced transfer fees. The market may be tricky to navigate these days, but we can and should find a way to do our business in a smarter way.
That said, De Ligt is a tremendous player and if he came here I would love seeing him play in our colors. I just do not think that it is sustainable to throw wads of cash at players, teams, and agents to acquire players who have (it seems) no desire to come here otherwise.
The issue is the prices being quoted for those players. I agree with you that there are plenty of players around who could improve us... the issue is that those players aren't often available for reasonable prices when you're Manchester United. Maguire is supposed to cost us £70m, which is similar enough to the price being quoted for De Ligt. Let's not pretend that Van Dyke and Maguire are comparable either. Buying from the Premiership is buying from some of the richest clubs in the world. I remember hearing last year that Burnley were richer than Ajax. Chelsea might have regretted that decision if Shaw hadn't had such a horrific injury.
Don't disagree, but Maguire is one of the most coveted, young English CBs out there since after the World Cup - of course Leicester are going to make you pay through your nose for him. I refuse to believe that there aren't similar talents available in France, Spain or Italy who would cost a fraction of him though, and that's where you should be looking. It might be harder and a bit more hit and miss, but if you try to find 2 £35m players instead of paying £70m for Maguire, you (i) might end up with 2 good players instead of 1, and (ii) you spread your risk around a bit. Of course they need to be of a certain standard, but if they play for the badge as a lot on here like to say, give their all and are young/able to improve even further, those are good signings imo.
I dont believe any of this for a second.
It seems strange to me there's no links with City/Liverpool, or they're being very quiet.
Our name always gets thrown about in transfers even if we aren't actually involved, so i'm pretty sceptical.
The usual "United is offering more money so they're in control" is an agents way of popping on another 10%
Our name always gets thrown about in transfers even if we aren't actually involved, so i'm pretty sceptical.
The usual "United is offering more money so they're in control" is an agents way of popping on another 10%
We're apparently not after a CB and have cooled our interest in De Ligt after we were initially interested over a year ago. Disappointing if true.
Would've thought he'd be the ideal Kompany successor for City though indeed.
I just hope Guardiola feels he isn't good enough on the ball for some strange reason. Maybe he doesn't like Blondes.
Mcguire is 26. He is young in the same way that Lingard is.
De Ligt is the one who is genuinely young in football terms.
Only if he performs . Ed has brought in plenty of players our previous managers wanted and that people thought were brilliant
Schweinsteiger
Di Maria
Sanchez
Pogba
Depay
Martial
Lindelof
Dalot
Lukaku
Bailey
Falcao
Zlatan
Darmian
Daley Blind
Amongst the rest alot of talent there but if they dont perform we will still question Ed .
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Fair enough, thought he was 23 or something like that.
I doubt it. People creamed themselves at many of his signings but because they were shite he’s been criticised for them.
I hear what you're saying, but honestly, sometimes it just comes down to the way the players adapt and perform. The figures touted for De Ligt are around what you paid for Van Dyke. We bought Fred for £53m, you got Fabinho for £40m. Fred went to the world cup, Fabinho didn't... but Fabinho has really impressed in the last 6 months, where Fred has had 3 or 4 good games for us. We've bought plenty of players in the £35m bracket... we bought Mkhitaryan, Matic, Bailly, Lindelof & (arguably) Sanchez for around that. We would probably have been better with two excellent £75m players.
"Manchester United, the one who blew Madrid out of the water 3 years ago have joined the server."
We all know Woodward lives for these sorts of moments. In time a player like De Ligt is available, I trust Woodward to hit the panic button and get Mbappe/Neymar money ready. We all mock his "Adult Disneyland" idea but if there's one aspect of it that I respect, it would be the habit of blowing oppositions away. Madrid was 3 years ago. Now Barcelona may well follow the same suit. The two powerhouses of Liga, of Europe...all blown away on the transfer market by the Manchester United who has been in disarray for 6 years.
This is the sort of story Woodward is in love with. And admit it, you muppets love it also despite the hate Woodward gets (rightfully, though).
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