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Paul Mitchell and recruitment in the future.

spurs9

Well-Known Member
Aug 31, 2012
11,844
34,019
Just saw this

https://twitter.com/gstobart/status/838826485377089536

More changes to THFC's recruitment staff. Paul Mitchell now gone & David Webb left role as 'head of elite potential identification' last wk

Also


Greg Stobart‏@gstobart20m20 minutes ago

Spurs turned down Ousmane Dembele & Alexander Isak for fraction of eventual fees. New chief scout Steve Hitchen now calling the shots.
Stobart added that Dembele & Isak decision were David Webb's and he was sacked, he didn't resign.

@gstobart
@TheSwedViking Eg have signed Dembele a year before his move to BVB for £1.5m but dallied and then wanted to put him in the U18s

@bankruptspurs
@gstobart His first shots should be fired directly at whoever made those decisions, to be honest.

@gstobart
@bankruptspurs David Webb - he sacked him last week!
 

Shadydan

Well-Known Member
Jul 7, 2012
38,247
104,143
Two guys with peep show on their CV, you'd expect them to be good at spotting talent.
 

JonnySpurs

SC Veteran
Jun 4, 2004
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Stobart added that Dembele & Isak decision were David Webb's and he was sacked, he didn't resign.

@gstobart
@TheSwedViking Eg have signed Dembele a year before his move to BVB for £1.5m but dallied and then wanted to put him in the U18s

@bankruptspurs
@gstobart His first shots should be fired directly at whoever made those decisions, to be honest.

@gstobart
@bankruptspurs David Webb - he sacked him last week!

If this is true then we need to gather a up a group, get some pitch forks and torches and run this fucker out of the country!

Ousmane Dembele for 1.5m and he said no! Any idiot even with a vague understanding of football could see that kid was gonna be a superstar. It's ok though he's only got 6 goals and 10 assists in 22 games for BVB this season and at 19 years of age.

FML.
 

Trix

Well-Known Member
Jul 29, 2004
19,337
329,025
If this is true then we need to gather a up a group, get some pitch forks and torches and run this fucker out of the country!

Ousmane Dembele for 1.5m and he said no! Any idiot even with a vague understanding of football could see that kid was gonna be a superstar. It's ok though he's only got 6 goals and 10 assists in 22 games for BVB this season and at 19 years of age.

FML.

Must be loads of idiots about then because he would have been watched by lots of scouts at that point in his career. If he was available for that amount of money there must have been something putting them all off.
 

spursfan77

Well-Known Member
Aug 13, 2005
46,680
104,956
Must be loads of idiots about then because he would have been watched by lots of scouts at that point in his career. If he was available for that amount of money there must have been something putting them all off.

It was the contract situation wasn't it?

Something I'm not sure that's even been cleared up despite moving clubs.
 

bceej

Well-Known Member
Mar 1, 2013
2,444
3,191
Must be loads of idiots about then because he would have been watched by lots of scouts at that point in his career. If he was available for that amount of money there must have been something putting them all off.

Rennes have a very good record for producing top flight players IIRC.
 

spurs9

Well-Known Member
Aug 31, 2012
11,844
34,019
If this is true then we need to gather a up a group, get some pitch forks and torches and run this fucker out of the country!

Ousmane Dembele for 1.5m and he said no! Any idiot even with a vague understanding of football could see that kid was gonna be a superstar. It's ok though he's only got 6 goals and 10 assists in 22 games for BVB this season and at 19 years of age.

FML.
TBF, it was before he had ever started a professional game that this all happened.
 

Trix

Well-Known Member
Jul 29, 2004
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TBF, it was before he had ever started a professional game that this all happened.

Probably, but he would have still been watched by dozens of top club scouts.

Just pointing out to @JonnySpurs, that it probably wasn't quite as obvious he was going to be a top drawer player as he thinks.
 

yido_number1

He'll always be magic
Jun 8, 2004
8,646
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Probably, but he would have still been watched by dozens of top club scouts.

Just pointing out to @JonnySpurs, that it probably wasn't quite as obvious he was going to be a top drawer player as he thinks.
Indeed it's easy to look back with hindsight and blame people. The fact is for every Dembele there is an Obertan and a Bebe. I imagine he was let go for missing a lot of these as just the two mentioned you couldn't blame any one for.
 

JonnySpurs

SC Veteran
Jun 4, 2004
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Probably, but he would have still been watched by dozens of top club scouts.

Just pointing out to @JonnySpurs, that it probably wasn't quite as obvious he was going to be a top drawer player as he thinks.

To be fair, the suggestion was that it was a year prior to him moving to Dortmund (which was in May 2016) so would he not have played a number of games for Rennes by this point? He made his debut in September of 2014 so he would have played a fair bit by summer of 2015 so I would argue that if it was my job to be a scout or in player recruitment then I'd like to think I'd have been able to identify whether he was worth a fair punt at 1.5m, thats all.

EDIT - In fact, Wikipedia suggests he'd made 22 apps and scored 13 goals by the summer 2015, 1st season in starting lineup for Rennes. Followed that up with 26 apps and 12 goals by Summer of 2016 when he was snapped up by BVB.

As I say, I dont know the full details around it so I may have been a bit hasty with my criticism but the reality is that this Webb chap did get sacked so he's clearly dropped the ball here and in other areas in seems.
 

Trix

Well-Known Member
Jul 29, 2004
19,337
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To be fair, the suggestion was that it was a year prior to him moving to Dortmund (which was in May 2016) so would he not have played a number of games for Rennes by this point? He made his debut in September of 2014 so he would have played a fair bit by summer of 2015 so I would argue that if it was my job to be a scout or in player recruitment then I'd like to think I'd have been able to identify whether he was worth a fair punt at 1.5m, thats all.

EDIT - In fact, Wikipedia suggests he'd made 22 apps and scored 13 goals by the summer 2015, 1st season in starting lineup for Rennes. Followed that up with 26 apps and 12 goals by Summer of 2016 when he was snapped up by BVB.

As I say, I dont know the full details around it so I may have been a bit hasty with my criticism but the reality is that this Webb chap did get sacked so he's clearly dropped the ball here and in other areas in seems.

Maybe he did look like he was worth a £1.5mil gamble at that point, but were we looking for that type of young promising player considering where the likes of Mason, Bentaleb, Onomah, Oduwa, Carroll, Winks, Edwards etc were at that time. You can only have so many players of one type in your squad at any one time and perhaps what we saw "at that point" was very similar to what we already had.
 
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bceej

Well-Known Member
Mar 1, 2013
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Maybe he did look like he was worth a £1.5mil gamble at that point, but were we looking for that type of young promising player considering where the likes of Mason, Bentaleb, Onomah, Oduwa, Carroll, Winks, Edwards etc were at that time. You can only have so many players of one type in your squad at any one time and perhaps what we saw "at that point" was very similar to what we already had.

Oosh Oduwa over Ousmane?
 

Cornpattbuck

Well-Known Member
Jul 23, 2013
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Stobart added that Dembele & Isak decision were David Webb's and he was sacked, he didn't resign.

@gstobart
@TheSwedViking Eg have signed Dembele a year before his move to BVB for £1.5m but dallied and then wanted to put him in the U18s

@bankruptspurs
@gstobart His first shots should be fired directly at whoever made those decisions, to be honest.

@gstobart
@bankruptspurs David Webb - he sacked him last week!

Find it hard to believe this because there's been so much hype about those two players for so long. Somehow, despite that hype and with most clubs looking at them, we had cut price deals available?!
 

sunnydelight786

Chief Rocka
Jan 7, 2007
6,075
4,241
Tbf I think there's was a substantial difference in the two scenarios. Suarez was more than just potential, he was by far the standout player in the Dutch league at that time. With Griezmann it was clear he had talent, but what was not clear was how consistent he could become. In all transfers there is an element of dice rolling going on, and the hardest job is knowing just how much of a gamble each player will be.
Please do tell us what 'Dice Rolling" was done in the Sissoko farce....? A dice roll is a Njie/Nkoudou/Wimmer/etc, a Griezmann/Suarez/Isco (when Malaga were having their fIre sale) were not 'dice rolls' as they had proven themselves domestically and played CL football for their respective clubs. We just royally screwed up so lets not dress it up any other way.....
 

Bus-Conductor

SC Supporter
Oct 19, 2004
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I saw O Dembele play a few times, including live, and said on here that I really rated him and would love us to go for him, but I think, as has been shown by the links posted on here, there was more to the Dortmund deal than meets the eye.

I was really disappointed we didn't go balls for the kid because he was very reasonably priced, had shown a shit load more genuine ability and potential than the likes of Njie or Nkoudou, but from what I have read since this seems to be a bit of a stitch up, as Dortmund paid about triple the buy-out, and there seems to be some connection via the Rennes chairman/Puma and Dortmund (see the links posted above in this thread).

As far as buying him the year before, the problem with this is it always sounds wonderful with hindsight, but there are so many of these "potential" uber kids aged 17/18/19 who show little glimpses of talent, the problem is that it is invariably a catch 22.

If these kids are to realise their potential they need to be playing week in week out, and to do that they need a club that is prepared to tolerate all the downsides of playing an 18/19yo every week, the mistakes, the lack of tactical experience, the naivety of decision making etc, for the possible pay-off of eventually ending up with a more developed player.

No top PL side can accommodate many of this type of player (some won't tolerate any) and so even if they buy one, he either ends up sitting on bench most weeks developing very little, or he gets packed off to the championship or League 1 on loan to get the shit kicked out of him, and unless he really shines at that level, which he might not through no lack of talent just the nature and tactics and team mates in those leagues, then his career stalls.

This is the problem. Players like Dembele become what they are because a French club has an economic and footballing incentive to tolerate and develop him. But by the time he's developed even a little (1 year in his case) he's already gone from 1.5m to a 20m player. Even Njie and Nkoudou were 10/12m players after in Njie's case about 15 full games.

Oduwa didn't even get 15 fucking minutes with us and I guarantee you, if he was French he'd have about 45 games under his belt now, Onomah would probably have about 60, same Winks and Pritchard. And we'd all be going "fuck me, can't believe we didn't snap them up for 1m after 5 games".
 
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danielneeds

Kick-Ass
May 5, 2004
24,179
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It always sounds so simplistic - could have had Dembele a year prior - etc. But I'm sure the truth was more complicated. Either way Mitchell and Webb are gone it seems - long live King Hitchen.
 

JonnySpurs

SC Veteran
Jun 4, 2004
5,345
12,398
Maybe he did look like he was worth a £1.5mil gamble at that point, but were we looking for that type of young promising player considering where the likes of Mason, Bentaleb, Onomah, Oduwa, Carroll, Winks, Edwards etc were at that time. You can only have so many players of one type in your squad at any one time and perhaps what we saw "at that point" was very similar to what we already had.

Fair point, you could well be right.
 

Trix

Well-Known Member
Jul 29, 2004
19,337
329,025
Please do tell us what 'Dice Rolling" was done in the Sissoko farce....? A dice roll is a Njie/Nkoudou/Wimmer/etc, a Griezmann/Suarez/Isco (when Malaga were having their fIre sale) were not 'dice rolls' as they had proven themselves domestically and played CL football for their respective clubs. We just royally screwed up so lets not dress it up any other way.....

Any other superstars we didn't sign from the past few decades you want to include? No we didn't sign those players, but then I'd say 99% of the teams in Europe didn't either. It always makes me chuckle when stuff like this is brought up, and is never balanced out. I mean for instance, yes we did miss out on those three players but we did sign Bale, Alli Walker, Rose and Dier all for pretty much peanuts. How many clubs fans do you think are slagging their club for fucking up not signing them. I agree ATM Sissokko looks like a poor deal, but every club gets some wrong. No transfer strategy is fool proof, but in the las 5 years or so we have had far more hits than we have had misses. It really is a shame some can't see that and only ever look at single transfers in isolation.
 
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