An Excellent Window! Here's why...

[double0]

All of you seem to forget that we've just spent £60m on what will be (for the long term future of the club) more important than any signing.

http://www.tottenhamhotspur.com/futureplans/trainingcentre/gallery.html

Use the money to clear the debt and stop paying interest. Read in the Guardian how Man Utd over the last few years have spent £300m on interest of their debt and only £100m on reducing that debt mg: Next season we can either sell Spurs Lodge or develop the land, could be a nice little earner that we can then either spend on players or put towards building the new stadium.

Coming along nicely whens the scheduled completion date?

 

[AngerManagement]

The window might not be as bad as many are suggesting but to say it was an EXCELLENT window is just madness and very wrong

 

[Spurs1960]

Are you saying Madness is wrong, oh dear....

 

[AngerManagement]

Are you saying Madness is wrong, oh dear....

no I am saying the assessment of this window by the original poster is both madness and wrong not that madness and wrong are one and the same

 

[StartingPrice]

no I am saying the assessment of this window by the original poster is both madness and wrong not that madness and wrong are one and the same

Madness sang Baggie Trousers - surely a reference to Daniel Levy :shrug:

 

[AngerManagement]

Madness sang Baggie Trousers - surely a reference to Daniel Levy :shrug:

Is he a naughty boy in a nasty school?

 

[SpurSince57]

All of you seem to forget that we've just spent £60m on what will be (for the long term future of the club) more important than any signing.

http://www.tottenhamhotspur.com/futureplans/trainingcentre/gallery.html

Use the money to clear the debt and stop paying interest. Read in the Guardian how Man Utd over the last few years have spent £300m on interest of their debt and only £100m on reducing that debt mg: Next season we can either sell Spurs Lodge or develop the land, could be a nice little earner that we can then either spend on players or put towards building the new stadium.

If you live in North London or South Herts you can get a pretty good view from the car park at Myddelton House Gardens in Enfield.

 

[StartingPrice]

Is he a naughty boy in a nasty school?

OOOH...OOOOH...OOOOOH...Oh...OH what fun we had...Eek

 

[chkthfc82]

As long as we win games of football I couldn't care less who we have signed or haven't signed.

 

[SpurSince57]

As long as we win games of football I couldn't care less who we have signed or haven't signed.

Exactamundo.

Steve, great post, with which I agree almost wholly; however, it's interesting that you say Gomes had a 'shocking' season, because his shot-to save ratio was a very decent 71%, a bit short of Hart's 77% but by no means poor. This goes to show that perception, if not all, counts for a great deal; when Gomes makes a blooper, it's not just any old blooper, it's a real doozy. I don't believe there's another keeper in the EPL who could save a penalty and then give another away just a minute. Now, I can live with this because he can pull off saves of which few others are capable, but I can also understand why he gives so many kittens. Friedel's sound, capable of some pretty spectacular saves himself, and has very few WTF? moments.

On the CB question, I've only really seen Cahill against us and on MOTD, but I suspect that's as much as most on SC have seen. A reported £13m for someone who's at best only a marginal upgrade on Dawson and Kaboul seems steep; frankly, a great deal depends on whether Dawson and Kaboul can get their act together. Against City it was like watching them four years ago. It's got to get better, surely. I'm not sure Samba would have been an improving addition other than for his amazing extendible legs.

Why didn't we cast our net wider? Well, Arsenal signed Mertesacker, a semi-mobile hulk who can be good in the air but also achieves the impressive feat of making Dawson and Huddlestone look quite quick. Perhaps there just aren't that many out there. Tasci's name came up in some ITK, but who knows?

 

[Spurger King]

On the CB question, I've only really seen Cahill against us and on MOTD, but I suspect that's as much as most on SC have seen. A reported £13m for someone who's at best only a marginal upgrade on Dawson and Kaboul seems steep; frankly, a great deal depends on whether Dawson and Kaboul can get their act together. Against City it was like watching them four years ago. It's got to get better, surely. I'm not sure Samba would have been an improving addition other than for his amazing extendible legs.

Why didn't we cast our net wider? Well, Arsenal signed Mertesacker, a semi-mobile hulk who can be good in the air but also achieves the impressive feat of making Dawson and Huddlestone look quite quick. Perhaps there just aren't that many out there. Tasci's name came up in some ITK, but who knows?

Cahill's very good, but not for that sort of price. It's amazing how some fans can go from calling Kaboul the natural replacement for King, to calling him a terrible player.

So many Spurs fans have the 'grass is greener on the other side' approach to our squad. In my opinion Cahill would not be much of an upgrade at all on Kaboul, and I'd rather have Bassong than Samba.

We've one of the best defenders on the planet in King, and we still have Gallas to come back as well. Bassong in the season before last was fantastic for us, and I very much doubt he's lost his abilities over night. More likely that he's suffered from not playing regularly, and with a regular partner.

I don't really rate Mertesacker that highly either. I'm happy enough with Dawson, King, Gallas, Kaboul and Bassong...with Caulker looking like a promising player for the near future as well.

In other words - missing out on Cahill has hardly had me reaching for the razor blades.

 

[Hoddle_Ledge]

Been away for a few weeks and only came on briefly for the last hour of the window.

What happened about all the big one talk? Levy time? Just fizzle out or nothing ever in it?

 

[journeyman]

I couldn't believe the negativity on here this evening.

I think it's been an excellent window.

(1) We managed to keep all our best players: Modric, Bale and Van der Vaart. This was despite not having Champions League football to offer and in the face of intense interest - and general expectation we would sell - in relation to Modric. Great credit to Levy here for not giving in.

(2) With a strong team that managed to finish fourth and fifth in the last two seasons, we still managed to improve our first eleven considerably with the addition of three key players in Friedel, Parker and Adebayor. A more consistent, reliable goalkeeper; a tough Footballer of the Year midfielder, who will drive the team on in key matches; and the kind of complete striker we've been crying out for. Great signings.

(3) We managed to get great money for some players who wouldn't have featured in our first eleven this year - Palacios, Crouch, Hutton, O'Hara, Keane - and to temporarily offload others on expensive wages - Jenas, Bentley. We made a significant profit in doing this, which can only be good for the club.

It wasn't a perfect window of course - it never is - I would have liked if we could have signed Cahill and would have preferred to offload Pav rather than Crouch. But it was a damn good window overall. Particularly when you consider Arsenal are massively weakened - anyone thinking Arteta and Benayoun are adequate replacements for Fabregas and Nasri are kidding themselves - and when so many of Liverpool's signings (Henderson, Adam, an aging Bellamy) are of questionable value. And when you consider these two latter sides will be our main rivals for a fourth place finish, I'm fairly optimistic anyway.

Anyone else prepared to admit we had a good transfer window yet?

 

[AngerManagement]

It certainly was a much better window than most of us thought at the time.

Our expectations have been raised from our qualification to the Champions League and VDV aside we were left underwhelmed for two straight windows while we watched Man City make the type of signings we had hoped for.

This last window went very slowly too, we expected the CL money we had generated to be invested back in the squad to regain our CL status and two games pretty much went past with us having only added a free transfer goal keeper to our ranks.

Window the window closed I will admit I was disappointed, I did however feel we had addressed our key issues and I was happy about that. I knew our 3 transfer would have big impact but I was at the time disappointed that we hadn't brought in cover for the centre backs (I mean a new first teamer to lead Dawson or Kaboul in the absence of King/Gallas)and I felt we should have brought in a extra striker as Adebayor alone would be putting our eggs in one basket.

I supppose in truth the reaction I had to the window holds true still, Parker has had a bigger impact even than I expected so that is a positive and I knew Adebayor would have a massive impact but we still lack cover for King and Ade and have to hope we can keep both fit.

I still would have liked to see us replace Pav and upgrade Dawson personally but I think as I thought at the time the signings we had made were good, well now I think they were great, but still I feel we didn't quite make enough signings to set us up for the whole season.

Hopefully King can stay fit because I don't feel comfortable with Dawson and Kaboul at the back (although with Parker and Sandro ahead of them they could look like world beaters) and I would hate to see us resorting to playing Pav in the absence of Ade.

 

[davros]

Anyone else prepared to admit we had a good transfer window yet?

I always though we'd done pretty well this window. Little outlay for quality additions to an already very decent first team. I was also pleased with the investment in exciting young attackers. They could flop, of course, but we have to make these investments if we can't compete for established talents.

Still, Parker has been better than I expected. Hell be worth a few points by the end of the season, and will only help Sandro's development.

 

[AngerManagement]

I always though we'd done pretty well this window. Little outlay for quality additions to an already very decent first team. I was also pleased with the investment in exciting young attackers. They could flop, of course, but we have to make these investments if we can't compete for established talents.

Still, Parker has been better than I expected. Hell be worth a few points by the end of the season, and will only help Sandro's development.

HE has already been worth quite a few I'd suggest

Key to our victories at Wolves and Wigan and I think if he were not playing against Arsenal we would have lost

 

[Caboose]

It was a good window, but we have been lucky in having King fit for every league match since the window closed. If he was out we'd be down to Kaboul and Bassong at the moment. Hopefully we'll be able to get through to the summer playing one of King or Gallas along side Dawson or Kaboul and then we will need to sign a serious centre back.

January we will need to sign another striker and let Pavman go as has been discussed heavily.

So overall all transactions were exactly what were needed, but I still feel we were one or two light from a perfect window.

 

[RichSpur58]

I stand by my judgement that the window was disappointing.

Yes we have a good team, but we could have had a better one. We spent 5m net.

As has been said, without King we would have been screwed.

 

[StartingPrice]

I stand by my original judgement.
I was actively in favour of us signing Adebayor and parker, and was very glad we made these deals.
I was one of the few who thought that Friedel was a shrewd deal.
We have yet to see, in real terms, the value of the Falque deal.
This strengthened the spine of our team immeasurably, and was achieved for £5 M...which is a good thing in itself, and, presumably, means we will have more for those 'special' signings in the future.

Keeping Modric was massive and like three top notch signings, in itself - one for the message it sent out, one for the benefit of having him in the team, and one for the hole it would have left in the team if he had been sold.

BUT...after all his talk of learning from previous mistakes, Levy left everything to the last minute, again. And I, for one, am convinced that if we had acted just a bit earlier in our acquisitions we may have done a bit better against the Manchester sides and those two results could be the difference between challenging for 4th and challenging for the title (even if I can uderstand the reasons given for the deals taking so long). And while I was very vocal in supporting Levy for his Modric stance, that players disposition clearly affected our results in the first two games - can't help thinking Levy could have made it clear that this was affecting our chances before those games, and went to the FA as the Chavs were destabilising our team over a player we had told them repeatedly wasn't for sale (not strictly transfer dealings, I know).

Also, while I said that ultimately, Modric should be concerned with where we finish this season, as a sign of our ambition, and not about how much money we spend, or who we buy, Levy did say he was going to buy players that would show Modric our ambition. I don't think that happened, and purely on those terms the window was not disappointing but was slightly underwhelming.

I also said, after the TW closed, that Levy is acting like a surrogate DOF (he clearly still favours this system), just not a particularly good one. If he wants that system, he should go back to it, and if Redknapp won't work with a DOF, hire a manager who will. Alternatively, if he wants to go with a conventional manager, ala Redknapp, he should give him the purse strings and allow him to conduct transfer business as a conventional manager. And if he can't trust Redknapp with the purse strings, he should hire a conventional manager who he will trust with the purse strings.

Alternatively, they can continue to muddle along, between them...and I suppose I can live with that as the team is progressing on the pitch - but it is certainly far from an ideal situation IMHO.

It was a good window, but we have been lucky in having King fit for every league match since the window closed. If he was out we'd be down to Kaboul and Bassong at the moment. Hopefully we'll be able to get through to the summer playing one of King or Gallas along side Dawson or Kaboul and then we will need to sign a serious centre back.

January we will need to sign another striker and let Pavman go as has been discussed heavily.

So overall all transactions were exactly what were needed, but I still feel we were one or two light from a perfect window.

And this - that's like another two top-notch signings, in itself!

 

[Caboose]

I also said, after the TW closed, that Levy is acting like a surrogate DOF (he clearly still favours this system), just not a particularly good one. If he wants that system, he should go back to it, and if Redknapp won't work with a DOF, hire a manager who will. Alternatively, if he wants to go with a conventional manager, ala Redknapp, he should give him the purse strings and allow him to conduct transfer business as a conventional manager. And if he can't trust Redknapp with the purse strings, he should hire a conventional manager who he will trust with the purse strings.

This is a very valid point, but in a way what we have now works. If Redknapp were to be left to do his thing, by all accounts he would have let Modric leave, I personally believe he also would have let other players go for a smaller amount than what we received. At the same time I believe he would have spent a lot of money - not lots on a few players, but a bit on a lot and we'd end up with an inflated squad draining resources.

Having Harry wanting to spend and Levy wanting to do what's financially best for our club gets us what we want in the end... it unfortunately takes too long to get there which hampers us.

Next summer will be interesting to see how they do. I can understand why things took so long to happen as I agree that we did have to sell before we could buy. Now the squad is the right size, apart from Bentley and Jenas to sale, I feel we're in a position to buy early. If the same thing happens next summer (also providing Harry is still here next summer) then questions will need to be answered and the structure will have to be shaken up.