Winter Transfer Window Scouting Thread 23/24

[matty74]

Wonder what happens if Richy and PEH leave.

No chance PEH leaves in January with Bissouma and Sarr away for a a few weeks and maybe not back until February sometime .
That’s if they both don’t get crocked while there away . Knowing our luck that’s just what will happen

 

[McFlash]

No chance PEH leaves in January with Bissouma and Sarr away for a a few weeks and maybe not back until February sometime .
That’s if they both don’t get crocked while there away . Knowing our luck that’s just what will happen

To be fair, none of us thought we'd sell Sanchez without getting cover.
Sometimes, if there's an opportunity to get rid of a player that has no future for a bit of wedge, you've just got to take the opportunity.
We've got to clear the decks to be able to rebuild, even if it's a short term pain.

 

[brasil_spur]

"Funds for January will be Limited we hope to get a couple in but they won't be big money purchases, plus any sales of course"

"There is some money set aside for the new team, but they haven't been brought in to scout players everyone already knows about, we are back to player trading to generate transfer funds"

From a very good source.

This isn't the worst thing in the world, we have far more success when we have to work within a budget and uncover players in the up to £40m range.

Richarlison, Romero and Johnson are the only player to have gone over that amount in the last 4 windows and the most expensive of those 3 (especially considering the HG premium for Johnson) is the biggest flop.

I certainly expect us to be paying attention to players that are out of contract in the summer, that's why either Tosin or Kelly seems like an obvious signing for us in Jan as both will be out of contract in the summer and both are prem proven HG defenders. Someone like Caeceres also makes a lot of sense given the fee quoted.

Outside of that I can't see much action, probably PEH out at the end of the month so we can generate some funds for summer and a loan deal for Jota until the end of the season with an option. If Jota comes in then potentially a loan deal for Gil out with an option too.

I think Dier and Lloris will likely both leave as well.

The worry is that assuming we get European football next season we're going to then need to bring in:

Another DM/CM.
Another ST.
Another WF.

Whichever way you look at that we're going to need to spend over £120m in the summer, which I guess with say £40m of incoming funds is probably just about within budget for us with European qualification.

 

[fecka]

The trouble with player trading is that we're not very good at it.
Many of our players aren't worth much anymore, so we're not going to raise much from clearing them out, apart from the wages.

I'd love nothing more than for us to go and spunk £100m on a single player but then I glance over at the likes of Man United and see how they operate and I'm kinda glad we're run the way we are.

It's a complicated thing and us fans are too emotionally involved.

I'd say we are becoming better at it again as many of our starters are very good and have good values. It's the past ones pre-Paratici that are haunting us.

Also, how many of those crazy expensive players have actually been good enough to justify the spend? I feel like the hit rate for that amount of money has been way too low. Just look at this list. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_association_football_transfers

I'd argue almost half of them have either been flops or not been good enough to justify the spending. PSG spent 360m on Mbappé and Neymar alone for them to be game changers but I don't believe they've won anything with them that they didn't already win.
On that top 20 alone, I'd only rate Rice, Bellingham, Cristiano(x2), Kane, and Bale as proper successes with Dembele, Higuain, Mbappé, Grealish (could arguably be labeled as not warranting the price tag), Gvardiol, and Neymar as maybes. That's 5 out of 20 as successes and maybe 11 at a stretch. Antony, Hazard, Pogba, Lukaku, Coutinho, Felix, Griezmann I'd label as flops.

Going down the rest of the list I'd argue it's still barely a 50% hit rate so why are we as fans so desperate to just chuck money at any big name out there?

 

[Ghost Hardware]

No chance PEH leaves in January with Bissouma and Sarr away for a a few weeks and maybe not back until February sometime .
That’s if they both don’t get crocked while there away . Knowing our luck that’s just what will happen

Considering he’s got a year and half left on his contract and Ange has supposedly been clear about his future here I think we would most certainly sell him this window as his value will have only gone down by summer. I’d be surprised if we weren’t actively shopping him around tbh.

 

[hero]

"Funds for January will be Limited we hope to get a couple in but they won't be big money purchases, plus any sales of course"

"There is some money set aside for the new team, but they haven't been brought in to scout players everyone already knows about, we are back to player trading to generate transfer funds"

From a very good source.

Thanks, Trix. I've been waiting for this for a while. We had been so poor before Paratici. Our transfer debt was £252million the last I checked. The stadium doesn't generate such a profit like CL or sponsorship. It seems we will become a selling club for some years as I cannot see we get a CL spot in the near future. That is why it is more baffling no to play our academy players.

 

[McFlash]

so why are we as fans so desperate to just chuck money at any big name out there?

I think we get sucked into the whole "gotta spend big to compete" thing.
Then we see our rivals do it and want some of that ourselves, even though and as you say, it doesn't always prove to be a benefit.
When we actually take a while to think about it, we spend a lot of money as a club, a hell of a lot but this is football and emotions take over common sense.

As I say, there's nothing better than unearthing a gem like Vicario for what basically amounts to small change and I think we have to appreciate that sort of signing more.
If we make two or three signings like him this window, it really doesn't matter how much we've spent.

 

[Danny1]

We've spent £250m so far this season, £180m last season, £95m season before, £110m before that, £150m before that....

3 quarters of a billion pounds spent in the last 5 seasons. THAT is where the money has gone. The issue isn't that we don't spend, the issue is until Paratici came in we spent so poorly and we are still paying the price in terms of both cash and squad places

Exactly this. Since the summer of 21/22 e have bought:

Vicario, Udogie, VdV, Romero, Porro, Bissouma, Sarr, Maddison, Kulusevski, Johnson, Solomon, Veliz, Phillips, Richarlison, Spence, Bentancur, Royal and Gil.

That is an awful lot of players and the large majority of them are deemed a success or seen as future stars (Veliz and Phillips).

What this does show is how badly our squad was depleted before this time. If you look at that list of players, the only player that plays for us (if all fit) that isn’t a part of it is Sonny. So in 2 years we have totally changed our first team squad. There is still work to be done for definite, but we have seen a large investment over the last few years with excellent work done by Paratici in my opinion.

The new team need to continue this good work and great scouting as I would disagree that all good players are known about. Vicario, Udogie, Porro, VdV and even Bentancur are better players than people thought they were. There are still great signings to be had in football that people aren’t fully aware of.

 

[Japhet]

To be fair, none of us thought we'd sell Sanchez without getting cover.
Sometimes, if there's an opportunity to get rid of a player that has no future for a bit of wedge, you've just got to take the opportunity.
We've got to clear the decks to be able to rebuild, even if it's a short term pain.

Particularly when it was widely touted and accepted at the time that this is a rebuilding process and will take a few windows to complete. Our exceptional start to the season seems to have raised expectations to a point where any sort of bump in the road is treated as a complete disaster.

 

[dirtydave]

Can we whisper our realistic wishlists in here?

Presnel Kimpembe - has returned from the injury, short contract, hugely experienced and would probably be happy as the third choice CB until he's fully fit.
Jobe Bellingham - got to be worth a punt! He reminds me of a baby Dembélé!
Luka Modrić - again worth a query if nothing else. The Saudi league doesn't deserve him!
Khvicha Kvaratskhelia - would take big money but the most natural successor to Son for me.
Victor Boniface - before Madrid pinch him, he's totally hit the ground running since his summer move to Leverkusen.
Nico Williams - gettable and is starting to bag assists from the right wing. Prefers those quick interchanging passes to walloping it into the box, therefore, would suit our play.

 

[Rosco1984]

What were people expecting? An injury nightmare doesn't change the fact we spent a lot of money in the summer and have added a lot of players in recent years.

Come next season Lloris, Perisic and Dier won't be here, you'd assume Hojbjerg'll go too and possibly my beloved Richy. That'll be a lot of wages that then become free. For the first time in ages, I'm convinced the direction of the club isn't just "buy these players or we'll not win" and actually is a bit more tangible.

Did we spend a lot in the summer we got over 100million in. Did we even spend that much?

 

[fecka]

Did we spend a lot in the summer we got over 100million in. Did we even spend that much?

Spent approx. 160m not counting Porro & Kulusevski. If we include those we're talking approx. 217m according to Transfermarkt and we got about 102m for Winks, Sanchez & Kane (I'm assuming this doesn't include add-ons & clauses).
No European money this year either.

 

[Russ1201]

Wonder what happens if Richy and PEH leave.

I would guess one signing so Levy makes a profit.

 

[fecka]

Since I'm bored today I thought I might just as well make a graph of our transfer business since I began following Spurs in 2011.

The new stadium has clearly been a game-changer for us in terms of the transfer business, but I also believe the TV money increased significantly at some point and I can't exactly remember when so it should be taken into account. However, it's also clear that we're ways off the likes of Chelsea, United, City & Newcastle in terms of spending power (or willingness to spend if you will).

Numbers are from Transfermarkt in euros.

 

[Ghost Hardware]

This isn't the worst thing in the world, we have far more success when we have to work within a budget and uncover players in the up to £40m range.

Richarlison, Romero and Johnson are the only player to have gone over that amount in the last 4 windows and the most expensive of those 3 (especially considering the HG premium for Johnson) is the biggest flop.

I certainly expect us to be paying attention to players that are out of contract in the summer, that's why either Tosin or Kelly seems like an obvious signing for us in Jan as both will be out of contract in the summer and both are prem proven HG defenders. Someone like Caeceres also makes a lot of sense given the fee quoted.

Outside of that I can't see much action, probably PEH out at the end of the month so we can generate some funds for summer and a loan deal for Jota until the end of the season with an option. If Jota comes in then potentially a loan deal for Gil out with an option too.

I think Dier and Lloris will likely both leave as well.

The worry is that assuming we get European football next season we're going to then need to bring in:

Another DM/CM.
Another ST.
Another WF.

Whichever way you look at that we're going to need to spend over £120m in the summer, which I guess with say £40m of incoming funds is probably just about within budget for us with European qualification.

Tbf VDV will be over 40 mil if he triggers his clause which he probably will and Porro was only just under 40 mil.

I agree in general tho that it isn’t the worst thing as long as our recruitment team continues to provide such high quality signings as we have been used to of recent. Reality is tho it will be hard, there are plenty of teams who work on a similar budget to us and many have significantly more hit and miss track records. Really so much of this will come down to how good at spotting talent the new team are.

It is certainly true that really a good recruitment team is required regardless what price bracket you work in. Just look at Utd’s dodgy recruitment despite spending vast sums. But it’s also true that on the whole the more developed and consistently good a player is the more expensive a player will be. Essentially working within a tighter budget wont necessarily go the same way for us as it has been due to change of staff BUT Ange does seem to have a clear idea of what he needs from both a ability and mentality point of view which hopefully will help a lot.

in Jan Improving the starting 11 will be near impossible but padding out the squad should certainly be doable. Ultimately we need to try and get CL so we can properly invest in the squad in summer, like you point out we will need to spend at that point if we actually want to improve as the first 11 that does still need work. In general buying in Jan is very very difficult so not having a big budget won't necessarily derail our season. I think a lot of players we might like, such as Nusa who we've been linked to, wont be available until summer. Most teams don't want to be loosing key players regardless how big they are and often players will be priced at a premium. This is a good reason we should be looking towards the South American leagues as often prices are lower in general and the season is over. Obviously the negative is that most players will have just played a full season and maybe take more time to adapt but when looking at rotation options rather then first team starters that shouldn't be so much an issue.

I think realistically for Jan we will get a CB and possibly Jota on loan as you say. Beyond that it depends on sales. I think if PEH leaves we will look to replace him straight away, after all if he had left in summer we probably would have bought Gallagher. Whilst I think that boat has sailed on that one I still think we would replace him straight away if he left. I think that would go for Richy also but I have a feeling he stays and even if he doesn't maybe Jota will just take his spot and we will wait until summer to address it.

 

[brasil_spur]

Spent approx. 160m not counting Porro & Kulusevski. If we include those we're talking approx. 217m according to Transfermarkt and we got about 102m for Winks, Sanchez & Kane (I'm assuming this doesn't include add-ons & clauses).
No European money this year either.

The numbers are:

23/24: Incomings: €247.6m - Outgoings: €117.2m - NET Spend: €130.4m
22/23: Incomings: €177.9m - Outgoings: €38.75m - NET Spend: €139.15m
21/22: Incomings: €95.9m - Outgoings: €34.62m - NET Spend: €61.28m

So in terms of spending that's averaging out at a NET spend of €110m per season.

Personally I think that's too low, but it is increasing, so if we continue to grow NET spend each season and let's say we spend around €40m in January, then we're at least heading in the right direction.

The other thing to consider is the wage bill. Currently we have £32.24m being spent in wages each year on the following players: Perisic, Lloris, PEH, Dier, Davies & Forster.

 

[Nick-TopSpursMan]

Big talent I believe. City have been looking at him.

 

[Ghost Hardware]

Big talent I believe. City have been looking at him.

Saw this, very very similar profile to Oscar Gloukh who we also have interest in. Gloukh looks the better talent at the moment IMO but both very highly rated. Does again raise the Donley question tho, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if we are looking for a loan for him.

 

[Nick-TopSpursMan]

Saw this, very very similar profile to Oscar Gloukh who we also have interest in. Gloukh looks the better talent at the moment IMO but both very highly rated. Does again raise the Donley question tho, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if we are looking for a loan for him.

Only watched a few videos but it seems to me Khannouss looks more comfortable in the CM areas where as Gloukh looks more of a CAM. Gloukh looks a lot more dribbly and final third based.

Khannouss seems to have good technique and is a lovely progressive passer by the looks of it.

 

[coys761]

People are saying we have Maddison for that spot, but doesn't Bayern have Musiala too? Personally, I think he'd lean towards us and the Prem over them.