Player Watch: Moussa Sissoko

Eric_s said:

Your assessment of Sissoko is pure bullshite. If he is half as bad as you imply how on earth did he become a professional player let alone a French national team player. Your bias bullshite discredit whatever opinions you have about him as a player.

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Dennis Wise, Joey Barton & Vinnie Jones all had/have international caps too, just saying.

@FMA So you dont believe the story that he only cost £17m if we sell in the summer?
Posters have been fairly insistent from the start that somehow the full fee wasn't payable.
I too like to think that the full fee is just a headline and there is more to this.
If you just think he will come good and can do without the conspiracies then good for you. I admire your faith and hope you are proved right.

One thing I am quite sure. Levy would not allow Sissoko to leave on free/cheap. Although his value is significantly decreased. I still think Levy may sell him for more than 15m in the summer

matthew.absurdum said:

One thing I am quite sure. Levy would not allow Sissoko to leave on free/cheap. Although his value is significantly decreased. I still think Levy may sell him for more than 15m in the summer

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He managed to get £18 million for Paulinho, he'll get a decent fee for Sissoko

(Although Paulinho is a better player than Sissoko and I didn't like Paulinho one bit)

spursfan77 said:

He managed to get £18 million for Paulinho, he'll get a decent fee for Sissoko

(Although Paulinho is a better player than Sissoko and I didn't like Paulinho one bit)

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Someone please send highlights of the Euro 2016 final to every club in China.

I'd be amazed if Levy has contracted us to pay the full £30m fee without certain milestones being triggered.

spursfan77 said:

He managed to get £18 million for Paulinho, he'll get a decent fee for Sissoko

(Although Paulinho is a better player than Sissoko and I didn't like Paulinho one bit)

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We got £11M for Paulinho.

All the story of Sissoko's fee amounts to is that it's payable in instalments, like almost every other deal.

The breakdown of the fee just means we pay in annual £6M instalments. If we sold him tomorrow, we still owe them that money for the duration of the contract. The suggestion that seems to be being made is that if we sold him before we'd paid it all, we would no longer have to pay the rest of the £30M -- which is palpably complete nonsense. Mike Ashley didn't become a billionaire by being an idiot. He's not going to make a deal that meant we could sell Sissoko after a year and only paying him £6M. Or 2 years and £12M. It would be a laughably bad deal for Newcastle.

thebenjamin said:

We got £11M for Paulinho.

All the story of Sissoko's fee amounts to, is that it's payable in instalments, like almost every other deal.

The breakdown of the fee just means we pay in £6M instalments. If we sold him tomorrow, we still owe them that money. The suggestion that seems to be being made is that if we sold him before we'd paid it all, we would no longer have to pay -- which is palpably complete nonsense. Mike Ashley didn't become a billionaire by being an idiot.

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He did it by breaking every employment law known to man... so yes he's an idiot

whitesocks said:

@FMA So you dont believe the story that he only cost £17m if we sell in the summer?
Posters have been fairly insistent from the start that somehow the full fee wasn't payable.
I too like to think that the full fee is just a headline and there is more to this.
If you just think he will come good and can do without the conspiracies then good for you. I admire your faith and hope you are proved right.

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I think you have me confused with someone else; I haven't posted in this thread.

whitesocks said:

@FMA So you dont believe the story that he only cost £17m if we sell in the summer?
Posters have been fairly insistent from the start that somehow the full fee wasn't payable.
I too like to think that the full fee is just a headline and there is more to this.
If you just think he will come good and can do without the conspiracies then good for you. I admire your faith and hope you are proved right.

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Have those posters been insistent with any hard facts or basis for their belief in a type of deal that has never been recorded before in the history of football(or probably in any business deal)? That's allied to Newcastle's insistence that he wouldn't leave for less than £30m and that Everton were also willing to meet the price.

It reminds me of Palin and Idle in Life of Brian:

Palin: Crucifixion? Good. Take a cross and walk down to the left.
Idle: No.
Palin: Oh.
Idle. They said I hadn't done anything too bad and I could walk free.
Palin: Well..congratulations.
Idle: Nah, only joking! It is crucifixion!

seanwhite1961 said:

Have those posters been insistent with any hard facts or basis for their belief in a type of deal that has never been recorded before in the history of football(or probably in any business deal)? That's allied to Newcastle's insistence that he wouldn't leave for less than £30m and that Everton were also willing to meet the price.

It reminds me of Palin and Idle in Life of Brian:

Palin: Crucifixion? Good. Take a cross and walk down to the left.
Idle: No.
Palin: Oh.
Idle. They said I hadn't done anything too bad and I could walk free.
Palin: Well..congratulations.
Idle: Nah, only joking! It is crucifixion!

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The thing is that nobody on this site (*) knows how much we paid, in how many instalments or with what clauses.

The Tottenham official site made no reference to fee. The Newcastle statement made reference only to 'an undisclosed fee'.

We have never said we paid £30m. They have never said we paid £30m. We have never said we're paying £6m per year or £17m up front. Nor have they. Everything we know about the Sissoko deal is pure speculation.

Consequently, it would make a lot of sense if we stopped obsessing about the money and focussed rather on how he's performing, because, at the moment, his game is being seen through the prism of this £30m figure and it's not helping him or us.

Frankly, I think Poch bought him because he saw him as the answer to one of last season's major problems, namely what to do when Lamela gets tired at the 70 minute mark. So many games were thrown away last year because we couldn't keep the pressing going. I think Sissoko was intended to come on for those 20 minutes and. in certain games, rotate in for Lamela to keep the level of intensity going and stop teams getting back into games. However, with Lamela out for the majority of the season, Poch hasn't been able to bring Sissoko in slowly. He's been rushed into the first team and he's struggled to deliver the same intensity that Lamela provided over 70 minutes and has suffered in comparison. The fact that this is pretty much all he's been brought in to do - in that he doesn't have the finesse and craft of Lamela - makes it even worse for those watching.

I could well be wrong. I'm on this site mostly to take the piss, not discuss tactics. But the premature departure of Lamela was the problem of 2015-16 (along with the 'but what if Kane gets injured' conundrum) and our big money moves in the Transfer Market appear to show that Poch felt that too. In much the same way, I guess our focus in the summer will be on buying players who give us enough cover to play 3 at the back whenever we want (e.g. a reserve left back with pace) because, as the last few weeks have shown us, that's become the problem with 2016-17.



(*) Actually, that may not be strictly true but, as far as I know, they haven't come out and said so yet.

Nine while nine said:

I'm on this site mostly to take the piss, not discuss tactics.

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When they get round to doing the fake news inquiry, the main event shouldn't be Trump or politics etc. it should be that one article (or was it actually just a series of tweets?) that started all the rubbish about us being able to basically choose how much we pay.

Flog him to China, I'll drive him myself. Just give me a couple of weeks notice.

matthew.absurdum said:

One thing I am quite sure. Levy would not allow Sissoko to leave on free/cheap. Although his value is significantly decreased. I still think Levy may sell him for more than 15m in the summer

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I'm not sure that's true. One bad club season in these kinds of situations doesn't tend to erase the underlying perception of a player. In Sissoko's case, that perception - and it's probably particularly true on the continent - is that he was the power-beast of that French team who played so well in the Euros. His value may well have dropped, but I don't think it would be significant.

One bad club season? This is his 3rd in a row

faze_coys said:

One bad club season? This is his 3rd in a row

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Not since his strong Euro displays it's not.

FMA said:

I think you have me confused with someone else; I haven't posted in this thread.

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I don't just pick people out randomly - that would be weird even for me.
Since you are here, do you have an opinion of Sissoko or his transfer that you want to share?

Moussa Sissoko has vowed to fight for his future at Tottenham after failing to impress during his debut campaign at White Hart Lane.

Spurs signed Sissoko for a club-record fee of £30million from Newcastle on the summer window’s transfer deadline – the move secured after some impressive performances for his country at Euro 2016.


However, the Frenchman has proved a massive disappointment under Mauricio Pochettino and has failed to hold down a consistent first-team spot.

He has just four assists in 24 games in all competitions, and is yet to score for his new club.

However, despite recent reports linking Sissoko with a move to AC Milan, the player insists he will stay and fight for his place at the club.

“My future is at Tottenham and I’m trying to give my best,” he told beIN SPORTS.

“I’m trying to learn because I have to get used to a new style of playing in a new team.”

Is this the right thread to post my admiration for Sissoko?
He's settled really well, has brought so much more to our team this year and if we're all honest he's been a snip at £30 million.

Yiddo777 said:

Flog him to China, I'll drive him myself. Just give me a couple of weeks notice.

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Ask your boss. He might give you 2 weeks notice.