I think the huge sums of money invested into transfers and the appointment of 2 very high profile managers answers that.
Old Trafford figurehead (Not Ed, Honest!) dictates an article to Ian Ladyman
- Thread starter Maradona10
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I agree and not agree. We have more holes but same time we need quality. It's difficult to find quality with 30 million these days. Of course, 80 million per player doesn't guarantee quality but chances are better. Let's say, i would choose 3 quality players (in next two windows) ahead of 5 average. LB, RW and midfielder with high ceiling and some pace and creativity. We need more world class players and game winners.
Does Jose have to create shitstorms everywhere and with everyone? Just don't answer the fecking press and their sensationalist questions, it's as simple as that.
The board is also clearly full with incompetent chumps so the whole situation makes me question what the future holds for Manchester United and if anyone has a long-term plan for development at all.
The board is also clearly full with incompetent chumps so the whole situation makes me question what the future holds for Manchester United and if anyone has a long-term plan for development at all.
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LVG, in hindsight, was a panic move. The guy was all over the place. The squad he assembled was even worse than the one he took over, if that's even possible (bar Martial). It was certainly made more difficult to take forward with plenty of not-good-enough players on high wages. LVG spent 250m. Out of those he acquired, it's Martial who's good enough. That's 200m spent badly.
If the board is desperate to truly challenge for major titles, they'll provide funds to address to obvious shortcomings, at least for positions that we do not have options. If Jose is having to look at cheap options, then that shows the board's ambition IMV.
To be fair, this was not really him creating a shitstorm but the reporters manufacturing one. He actually made a very valid point - that we've invested, but that we need to invest more. It was a damned-if-he-does-damned-if-he-doesn't situation actually. If he said we'd invested enough, well, then it's him and the team that's not performing well enough. And when he was honest and said we needed more, well, then he's "slamming the board". He's also come out and clarified that he has been backed and has no complaints. I really think this is a lot of overreaction to his statements.
On another note though, he was always going to be controversial. Let's stay grounded and not bother with what the gutter press has to say, really.
I do agree with this.
I doubt if Jose would just flippantly go to the press, from the start.
I am sure that the "vibes" of not wanting to spend money are there and Jose is getting worried that he has been employed to keep the team in the top 4 (a la Arsenal), make money for the owners and not actually win anything.
Jose needs to keep the pressure on the board to spend the money, otherwise, they'll happily do the "no value in the market" thing, which they did with Fergie for several years, forcing Fergie to make do with scraps. The problem with that is that when Fergie left, we'd reached a point where we had a bunch of senior players, who were nearing departure, without any quality young players coming through the ranks.
My understanding is that the owners merely want us to retain top 4. If we drop out, it hits them financially.
If we spend an extra £300M to win the the title, we don't earn that money back, so it's best to just keep hitting top 4, on a moderate budget.
And regarding the marques signings: players which can be heavily marketed, can end up earning the club money in return.
Say if we spent £200M on Messi. We'd earn a lot of extra revenue from his signing.
But if we sign someone like Perisic. We'd probably earn nothing back in return.
So, it makes sense to spend £200M on Messi, but no sense in spending £40M on Perisic.
To be honest, I would much rather if he becomes boring during these press-conferences and answers shortly to everything, since all the drama is bringing even more pressure on the club, himself and the players.
I get your point though and agree to an extent, but especially considering our current situation, it would be much better just to not give anything that the press might use against the club, in my opinion.
The squad was behind City's before Jose and Pep showed up and Pep has bought many more players than Jose. Its not rocket science
True. I'd also argue that merely knowing that you can buy anyone at any time keeps the pressure on the City players. Whereas you can be a bit of a passenger at United and you'll not be shown the door, especially if you're earning loads.
Whether it's 200m spent well or badly is irrelevant
when it comes to the boards ambition. Have they not provided huge sums of money? We have more players in the top 15 most expensive signings than any other club. We broke the transfer record last season. We just spent 70m+ on Lukaku in the last window. We spent more on wages than anyone. I can't see how you can genuinely question the boards ambition here.
Obviously Mourinho hasn't been getting the message behind the scenes that he'll be backed to turn around the squad. Glad to hear Woodward acknowledges the lack of quality.
An unproven Southampton defender costs £75m these days so that £150m won’t get you very far!
Maybe ambition is a worse term than vision.
I think that, if this is the board's position, it is a sensible one. I don't think they can be fairly criticized for not spending enough in the recent years, and in any event it is quite silly to go out in media and say that you are going to spend a lot of money before actually entering into negotiations. The pressure Mourinho puts on the owners/directors will be used against United in negotiations by selling teams to demand a higher fee.
You could say they have made some wrong choices, but not lacked ambition.
I could say they lack vision and footballing sense.
Well no manager speaks public on transfer and spending. Jose did speak about it means he puts pressure on Ed! Or he tried to tell the board his message in closed doors but they didn't listen? And why his comments would put the board under pressure anyway unless they know exactly he was right about it!
At least this shuts up the people going on about how the board are content with top 4.
If we want real quality, we'll probably have to.
As long as they know Jose inherited a shower of shite and they are willing to spend what it takes to significantly improve the team, that's the main thing.
IMO our board knows very little about football, they were used to SAF who was magnificently covering that hole everything was in his control, what happened after is that they trusted DM and LVG because simply they were not having the right Ppl with football vision they are businessmen making awful lot of money from running our club without knowing football. IMO we need to spend on the right Ppl who have good vision of football first. IDK if SAF is involved in some decisions regarding signing players or so but we need at first the right men on desks.
The only thing concerning about this is how it feels now the board acknowledges that Mourninho is their choice manager to restore to the pinnacle of European football. There were comments made by Jose in the media were taken out of context and overblown in my opinion; but when there is a direct refutation that tells me that the board is 100% vested in Mourinho leading the club back to European and domestic glory.
Whether that is a good thing or bad thing will be determined in due time, but we should be in for some exciting transfer windows (January and Summer).
Whether that is a good thing or bad thing will be determined in due time, but we should be in for some exciting transfer windows (January and Summer).
I don't understand how these people think. Sir Alex ran our whole football programme, then they get training ground coaches and hope that they can do what the great man did. They should have foreseen that its going to take more than one individual to replace Sir Alex. Instead now we're stuck with someone leading the club who's never been in this situation of absolute power and for whatever reason we're shocked when they do a terrible job. Knew it was going pear shaped the moment I heard Moyes likes to spend time with the players on the grass, we're too big a club and have expectations are too high for someone to come in here, have a hands on approach to every training session and still try to handle all our transfer business. When Sir Alex used to do that (in the late 80's to early 90's) it was a far simpler time in the market. Now we can seem to make one transfer at below market prices for the quality we receive.
2 marquee signings? have a bad feeling that Bale could be one of them.
Still a marquee signing for the hospital
Wouldn't mind if the marquees are Kane and Dybala, would you?
Looking back at Jose's comments on spending and comments on City, I think it's born out of frustration from the squad he's inherited. If you read between the lines, it looks like he wants rid of the likes of Mikhitaryan because it hasn't worked out as he would have liked it to but the board are most likely telling him to slow down and make it work for now. I certainly explains why he mentioned Pep buying two goalkeepers in the space of one season.
Well - maybe what they aren't happy with it his him using the press to talk about it all the time, rather than the point Mourinho is trying to make.
All I know is that I don´t see any other big club discuss their transfer budget via the media.
Hello Mr. Woodward I heard your manager is very unhappy about his squad and desperate to add some marquee signings. You publically agreed with him and will provide the funds, so that´s Dybala 150M + 20% desperation fee. That´s 180M, shall we start the negotiations there.
Hello Mr. Woodward I heard your manager is very unhappy about his squad and desperate to add some marquee signings. You publically agreed with him and will provide the funds, so that´s Dybala 150M + 20% desperation fee. That´s 180M, shall we start the negotiations there.
This is good.
Until a new article emerges which will say board is content with top 4 while the money is coming in.
Until a new article emerges which will say board is content with top 4 while the money is coming in.
That'd be grand. Except there'd be no money left for other signings for quite some time.