AVB on Modric & Daniel Levy

[Paolo10]

Tell me, what do you think the reaction on here would have been if Harry had come out with this?

According to one of the most reliable ITKs AVB thought he was speaking off the record to a Spanish journo.

If HR had come out with this there would have been lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth....He should fucking shut his fucking trap!....Fuck sake Twitchy is at it again!....Keep your fucking mouth shut Harry....Keeping his media pals onside, what a **** etc.

 

[Blake Griffin]

at least avb is backing the chairman with these comments. unlike harry changing his mind each week and undermining levy ... "if you want to progress then you've got to keep your best players" [levy says luka won't be sold] "but we could sell him and bring in 3 or 4 new players and make the team stronger"

 

[Bus-Conductor]

Tell me, what do you think the reaction on here would have been if Harry had come out with this?

According to one of the most reliable ITKs AVB thought he was speaking off the record to a Spanish journo.

Are we talking about the quotes we've had recently saying something like "we understand Modric wants to leave, he is a great player, I tried to sign him, but the chairman will do what's right for the club". Or has something else been said ?

 

[Paolo10]

at least avb is backing the chairman with these comments. unlike hary changing his mind each week and undermining levy ... "if you want to progress then you've got to keep your best players" [levy says luka won't be sold] "but we could sell him and bring in 3 or 4 new players and make the team stronger"

He was told he had to sell to buy, people would want to buy Modric, who was being arsey again. Just like you are now.

 

[sloth]

Fuck me reading this thread proves what a bunch of consumerists we have become. A good 60% - 70% couldn't negotiate there was out of a paper bag (or something...). Cave in. His market value is what the other lot offer you. I want rid so just sell. Just let them buy... etc.

You can't waver. You have to stick to your principles. And the more the player kicks and shouts about it the more intransigent you've got to be. Work with us, and we'll work with you, work with the other lot and you'll never get what you want, has got to be the message. And not just for this transaction but for all future ones. We want buying clubs to know that if they want to buy our crown jewels, then they've got to pay the King's ransom, and no matter what tricks they try to get the price down, we won't cave, or even budge. It's straightforward with Levy, pay up, or fuck off. If it become pay up, or when you play your silly games we'll knock 30% of the price, then what do you think people will do in the future when they want our players?

The ridiculous thing was we had the exact same argument last year, with fans of this club, and others getting all old womany, saying we should simply get rid, finally they were proven to be no-nothing numpties, and yet here we go again and they're coming out with the same shit again...

 

[Bus-Conductor]

Fuck me reading this thread proves what a bunch of consumerists we have become. A good 60% - 70% couldn't negotiate there was out of a paper bag (or something...). Cave in. His market value is what the other lot offer you. I want rid so just sell. Just let them buy... etc.

You can't waver. You have to stick to your principles. And the more the player kicks and shouts about it the more intransigent you've got to be. Work with us, and we'll work with you, work with the other lot and you'll never get what you want, has got to be the message. And not just for this transaction but for all future ones. We want buying clubs to know that if they want to buy our crown jewels, then they've got to pay the King's ransom, and no matter what tricks they try to get the price down, we won't cave, or even budge. It's straightforward with Levy, pay up, or fuck off. If it become pay up, or when you play your silly games we'll knock 30% of the price, then what do you think people will do in the future when they want our players?

The ridiculous thing was we had the exact same argument last year, with fans of this club, and others getting all old womany, saying we should simply get rid, finally they were proven to be no-nothing numpties, and yet here we go again and they're coming out with the same shit again...

In theory I wholeheartedly agree Sloth, but in practice it is not quite as easy as that. We need to replace someone this good preferably. If we accept that he can go but only for the right price, we can end up with another Berbatov situation. It rankles on all summer, disrupts the group, heaps negativity on the club, and you end up losing your best player at the last minute and unable to replace him with the connotations for the team that all that brings. It was catastrophic for us last time this happened, ended up with a disastrous start and a managerial sacking.

I'm not saying bend over either, but it's hard. It really is best for us to get this concluded sooner rather than later as well. Not at any price, but the price can be more than monetary to us.

 

[StartingPrice]

Let's do a deal at £30 mill.

It's time to move on from this.

Let's give the child what he wants (us to accept a low-ball offer, even though it is not in our benefit to do so) because we don't like his tantrums.

Not a great parenting technique.

 

[StartingPrice]

Are we talking about the quotes we've had recently saying something like "we understand Modric wants to leave, he is a great player, I tried to sign him, but the chairman will do what's right for the club". Or has something else been said ?

New stuff - allegedly said by AVB whenboarding plane, and backed up by Stobart Twitter (apparently ), the gist of which is that the Modric-Pony just decided not to show for the US tour (I caveated my first post if this is true, but there's a good chance that it is).

Fuck me reading this thread proves what a bunch of consumerists we have become. A good 60% - 70% couldn't negotiate there was out of a paper bag (or something...). Cave in. His market value is what the other lot offer you. I want rid so just sell. Just let them buy... etc.

You can't waver. You have to stick to your principles. And the more the player kicks and shouts about it the more intransigent you've got to be. Work with us, and we'll work with you, work with the other lot and you'll never get what you want, has got to be the message. And not just for this transaction but for all future ones. We want buying clubs to know that if they want to buy our crown jewels, then they've got to pay the King's ransom, and no matter what tricks they try to get the price down, we won't cave, or even budge. It's straightforward with Levy, pay up, or fuck off. If it become pay up, or when you play your silly games we'll knock 30% of the price, then what do you think people will do in the future when they want our players?

The ridiculous thing was we had the exact same argument last year, with fans of this club, and others getting all old womany, saying we should simply get rid, finally they were proven to be no-nothing numpties, and yet here we go again and they're coming out with the same shit again...

I'm sorry

Oh, and I agree.

In theory I wholeheartedly agree Sloth, but in practice it is not quite as easy as that. We need to replace someone this good preferably. If we accept that he can go but only for the right price, we can end up with another Berbatov situation. It rankles on all summer, disrupts the group, heaps negativity on the club, and you end up losing your best player at the last minute and unable to replace him with the connotations for the team that all that brings. It was catastrophic for us last time this happened, ended up with a disastrous start and a managerial sacking.

I'm not saying bend over either, but it's hard. It really is best for us to get this concluded sooner rather than later as well. Not at any price, but the price can be more than monetary to us.

But in practice we have shown ourselves to be flexible. We know that he wants to go to Real, so we aren't trying to shoe-horn him into a move elsewhere. Sources indicate that we are willing to accept £35 million, when we could, feasibly, expect at least £40 million if we held an auction and tried to shoe-horn him to the highest bidder.

I don't think anyone is disagreeing that we want it over with as quickly as is possible, we don't want that poison and negativity at the club. What we are disagreeing about is whether we should just accept Real's scummy low-ball offer, when they knew what the price was, and then using the player (just like Chelsea did last Summer, and who is allowing himself to be used), just becuase he throws a tantrum. Exactly as Slothio said, all clubs, always, will know, if we bow to this, that whenever they want our crown jewels all they have to do is make a low-ball offer and tap the player into a tantrum.

I would rather, if Lewis is still willing to back Levy on this, we bought a replacement and ruined the little feck's career, or, alternaticely, examine the possibility of sacking and suing him, like Chelsea did with Mutu, at which point he wouldn't be able to play until the issue was resolved and it took quite a while with Mutu if I remember rightly. I would rather that than letting him and Real get away with this sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-ITE!

 

[SpurSince57]

Are we talking about the quotes we've had recently saying something like "we understand Modric wants to leave, he is a great player, I tried to sign him, but the chairman will do what's right for the club". Or has something else been said ?

See the OP, B-C. It's the bit after that he might have wished he'd left unsaid. It's hardly terribly serious in itself, but it's a little worrying that he's naive enough to think he can go 'off the record' with journos, especially as most of the ****s in the British media can't wait for him to fail.

 

[Mullers]

I don't see a problem with what AVB said basically he said Modric is a good player but the stance he is taking is wrong. AVB has got a long way to go before he reaches Harry's flimflam contradiction status.

 

[SpurSince57]

I don't see a problem with what AVB said basically he said Modric is a good player but the stance he is taking is wrong. AVB has got a long way to go before he reaches Harry's flimflam contradiction status.

It's more his going on to say that Levy's in the US because of his wife's illness and this is therefore not the best time to piss him off. Just because that's an open secret doesn't mean Levy will be happy having his chief coach spilling the beans to a journo.

 

[Bus-Conductor]

But in practice we have shown ourselves to be flexible. We know that he wants to go to Real, so we aren't trying to shoe-horn him into a move elsewhere. Sources indicate that we are willing to accept £35 million, when we could, feasibly, expect at least £40 million if we held an auction and tried to shoe-horn him to the highest bidder.

I don't think anyone is disagreeing that we want it over with as quickly as is possible, we don't want that poison and negativity at the club. What we are disagreeing about is whether we should just accept Real's scummy low-ball offer, when they knew what the price was, and then using the player (just like Chelsea did last Summer, and who is allowing himself to be used), just becuase he throws a tantrum. Exactly as Slothio said, all clubs, always, will know, if we bow to this, that whenever they want our crown jewels all they have to do is make a low-ball offer and tap the player into a tantrum.

I would rather, if Lewis is still willing to back Levy on this, we bought a replacement and ruined the little feck's career, or, alternaticely, examine the possibility of sacking and suing him, like Chelsea did with Mutu, at which point he wouldn't be able to play until the issue was resolved and it took quite a while with Mutu if I remember rightly. I would rather that than letting him and Real get away with this sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-ITE!

Can you link me to the quotes that AVB is supposed to have made ?

Again, I agree in principle with what you and Sloth are saying. Modric is on a nice long contract so he doesn't have us completely over a barrel. I would respect Levy enormously if he made another bold stance re this, but how much good did it do us with Berbatov ? It affected our start to the season unquestionably, moral was awful, and the last thing we want with a new manager is that kind of clusterfuck affecting the dressing room.

For the record, we did (and have done) exactly the same to other teams. Portsmouth had agreed a better deal to sell Crouch, but we made him dig his heels in refuse to go elsewhere and they were forced to accept our low(er) ball offer. My admiration for the way Levy has run this club is on record, but if you're going to live by the sword, you're going to have to be prepared to die by it occasionally. I wonder if Real were remembering how Levy got VDV out of them for 8m and them paying most of his salary ? I do not think for one second we will sack him and sue him, I'd sooner swallow some pride, take 30m and re-invest and move on, because as much as the principle would be bang on, the reality would be we as a club would ultimately loose out bottom line. We'd have no Modric and for the immediate future, no money to re-invest.

I hope we are refusing to pay Modric and fining him to boot, and I wish we were rich enough as a club to go and buy his replacement and let him rot, but the reality is , we aren't.

This is what I meant when I said it is lose/lose situation for us. Even with the transfer fee we will struggle to replace Modric (I would love Moutinho but will that happen ?) if we make a stance we face disruption etc. The best outcome would be if another club came in but then we risk losing him to a rival etc.

 

[Bus-Conductor]

See the OP, B-C. It's the bit after that he might have wished he'd left unsaid. It's hardly terribly serious in itself, but it's a little worrying that he's naive enough to think he can go 'off the record' with journos, especially as most of the ****s in the British media can't wait for him to fail.

What this bit ?:


"I think Modric is wrong. This will go against him.
He has worsened the situation with what he is doing and now the president is very angry, it's also not a good time to catch Daniel Levy. He is in the U.S. because his wife is ill."

If he didn't want that out there in the public domain then it was daft to say it to a journalist, I agree, but do any of us think it's wrong or divisive ? Clearly his words are standing by the club/chairman.

 

[SpurSince57]

As I said, it's hardly serious in itself, and nor is Mrs Levy's illness the world's best-kept secret. Telling a journo that something is of the record and expecting him to respect that is none too bright, though.

 

[Bus-Conductor]

If HR had come out with this there would have been lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth....He should fucking shut his fucking trap!....Fuck sake Twitchy is at it again!....Keep your fucking mouth shut Harry....Keeping his media pals onside, what a **** etc.

I think there is a huge difference between what AVB has said there and the contradictory, divisive, self serving bollocks Redknapp would spout almost every time a journalist tapped on his window for 4 years.

 

[StartingPrice]

Can you link me to the quotes that AVB is supposed to have made ?

Not if it's in the ITK/Transfer Rumour section

What this bit ?:


"I think Modric is wrong. This will go against him.
He has worsened the situation with what he is doing and now the president is very angry, it's also not a good time to catch Daniel Levy. He is in the U.S. because his wife is ill."

If he didn't want that out there in the public domain then it was daft to say it to a journalist, I agree, but do any of us think it's wrong or divisive ? Clearly his words are standing by the club/chairman.

Yeah, that's the one.
My personal take, claims that he thought it was off the record notwithstainding, was that he is quite happy to have it in the public domain and yes, I agree, je is just standing by the Chairman - some folk do seem to think he shouldn't have said it. I presume that they think he should be courting the player like 'Arry did, but that fails to see the apparent differences, namely, Levy would absolutely not let him leave last Summer whereas he will this Summer, and there was, apparent because of the former, a very good chance that the manager/coach would be working with Modric so it made sense to sooth the situation, whereas there is absolutely no chance he will ever play for us again (IMHO) so there is now no need to do this. There is, IMHO, a need for the manager/coach to stand by the Chairman and see that the best interests of the club are served /of, innit!

Anyway, I do understand what you are saying - the problem is that, short of Real saying "We sorry we behave like twats, here eeees £35 - £40 million and/or Sahin", that none of the scenarios is a good one, so we have to choose the least bad one for the club. Afaiac, that would be seeing that the integrity of the club is preserved even if it means Lewis haveing to back Levy financially to ensure that we don't lose out by taking a very hard stand with him. Any other scenario, short of Madrid doing the right thing, would be even worse IMHO.

In any case, I am hoping that this is, for the most part, conjecture, hot air, and posturing, and we can ease the modric-Pony on his loathsome little way for a huge donga of wonga and/or a decent player

 

[Riandor]

Well avoiding the minefield of HR's press "tactics" vs AVB's...

If Modric has done all of the above and is now being fined, then that suffices. Look at City and Tevez, similar issues, it did Tevez no favours what so ever and he had to come crawling back and apologise.

I agree with BC on this too, suing the player or leaving him to rot is a great stance on principle, but it makes little overall business sense. Fining Modric wages in the mean time though should be totally sufficient. Not training Luka? Not paying you, simple as.

Whilst I would not accept a low ball offer, I believe THFC and RM will find at some point some common ground on this and it's not as if we haven't gone in equally low on many an offer ourselves, so we need to be sure we don't call the kettle black here.

But we need the money for re-investment and unless uncle Joe is going to toss away 40m (give or take) just to make a stand, then he will be sold.

In the mean time i am happy he isn't out in LA with the team, if he is going (and one assumes it will happen) then i don't want him anywhere near the 1st team squad. Act professional, see what happens and train, no issues, but he has shown he doesn't want to do that, so he needs to stay away.

The other issue is again as BC stated the Berbatov-esque lessons. We got excellent money for Berbatov, but no time to spend it and a season or 5 without a top grade striker really hurt us. We are stronger in midfield and can mitigate the loss to a point, but if we have learned anything from that saga, then it should have been accept slightly lower fee, spend on replacement BEFORE WINDOW SHUTS.

This window we have no excuses on time frames.

Lastly, no issues with AVB's stance. Think the "leaked" story is a bit of a non event tbh. Manager upset at petulant player behaviour?! Shocking... Doubt Levy is bothered either other than in a "Careful what you say Andre, this was no issue, but the next off record conversation might be".

 

[Singaspur]

It's a ticklish balance to strike. Can't bow to player power and sell cheap but don't want to end up with a last-minute Berba-type situation. How about we tell RM that if they don't meet our price soon (not exactly sure when 'soon' is but basically mean in time for us to use the cash to good effect) then it becomes a Carroll-Torres type of deal i.e. the price becomes Porto's price for Moutinho + X mil?

 

[StartingPrice]

Well avoiding the minefield of HR's press "tactics" vs AVB's...

If Modric has done all of the above and is now being fined, then that suffices. Look at City and Tevez, similar issues, it did Tevez no favours what so ever and he had to come crawling back and apologise.

I agree with BC on this too, suing the player or leaving him to rot is a great stance on principle, but it makes little overall business sense. Fining Modric wages in the mean time though should be totally sufficient. Not training Luka? Not paying you, simple as.

Whilst I would not accept a low ball offer, I believe THFC and RM will find at some point some common ground on this and it's not as if we haven't gone in equally low on many an offer ourselves, so we need to be sure we don't call the kettle black here.

But we need the money for re-investment and unless uncle Joe is going to toss away 40m (give or take) just to make a stand, then he will be sold.

In the mean time i am happy he isn't out in LA with the team, if he is going (and one assumes it will happen) then i don't want him anywhere near the 1st team squad. Act professional, see what happens and train, no issues, but he has shown he doesn't want to do that, so he needs to stay away.

The other issue is again as BC stated the Berbatov-esque lessons. We got excellent money for Berbatov, but no time to spend it and a season or 5 without a top grade striker really hurt us. We are stronger in midfield and can mitigate the loss to a point, but if we have learned anything from that saga, then it should have been accept slightly lower fee, spend on replacement BEFORE WINDOW SHUTS.

This window we have no excuses on time frames.

Lastly, no issues with AVB's stance. Think the "leaked" story is a bit of a non event tbh. Manager upset at petulant player behaviour?! Shocking... Doubt Levy is bothered either other than in a "Careful what you say Andre, this was no issue, but the next off record conversation might be".

You have to bear in mind the various caveats I have put into this thread, R.
You a right, and I have said several times I hope it is not all as has been reported. I am just trying to present a Null Hypothesis if he persists in the (alleged) attitude and Real persist in their low-balling/unsettling tactic to the Nth degree - in which case I don;t see what other tactic we could pursue.
Of course it would be ideal, as I said, if they just presented us with a more reasonable offer.
Of course, hopefully, even if he did this, a fine is sufficient if we can reach an eventual satisfactory outcome.
But if both Madrid and Modric have truly simply tried to present uf with a united front of lowballing by the former and disruption by the latter, and persist in this approach indefinitely, eventually we will need to find some kind of resolution. As far as I can see, the two main options would be: to follow them all the way round to the bike shed saying I'm gonna do you, I'm gonna fecking kill you, you're fecking for it, etc., etc., and then when we get there say I don't want to fight you...here, here...take my gobstoppers ; or ,alternatively to maintain our stance and show we are prepared to pursue it to the Nth degree.

 

[Riandor]

You have to bear in mind the various caveats I have put into this thread, R.
You a right, and I have said several times I hope it is not all as has been reported. I am just trying to present a Null Hypothesis if he persists in the (alleged) attitude and Real persist in their low-balling/unsettling tactic to the Nth degree - in which case I don;t see what other tactic we could pursue.
Of course it would be ideal, as I said, if they just presented us with a more reasonable offer.
Of course, hopefully, even if he did this, a fine is sufficient if we can reach an eventual satisfactory outcome.
But if both Madrid and Modric have truly simply tried to present uf with a united front of lowballing by the former and disruption by the latter, and persist in this approach indefinitely, eventually we will need to find some kind of resolution. As far as I can see, the two main options would be: to follow them all the way round to the bike shed saying I'm gonna do you, I'm gonna fecking kill you, you're fecking for it, etc., etc., and then when we get there say I don't want to fight you...here, here...take my gobstoppers ; or ,alternatively to maintain our stance and show we are prepared to pursue it to the Nth degree.

Caveats accepted my friend.

If RM stay low in their offer then we should simply not accept and continue to fine Modric until he reports back for training. I think man City mostly did it right with the Tevez saga and eventually he came back and was still important to them in the latter games of the season. Not to say Tevez hasn't greatly gone down in my estimation, but he did come back and play.

Now, we could say that's what Modric did last season, ok fine, but a contract is a contract and he needs to abide by it. So for this reason I dvocate the fining stance... money not spent on Modric's wages is money saved. Not paying him another penny until his contract expires is approx 20m!

The chaos of suing players though is one to not be taken lightly and I would rather pursue other means first.