My Thoughts On This Summer's Transfers

[degoose]

The team is stronger overall but there is a giant Bale-sized hole in it we were never going to be able to fill. I don't think that anyone can doubt that we have gone about our business in the right way but let's not forget that we haven't spent any money. No £50M largesse from Uncle Joe, nor the extra £38M we get from the new TV deal. Not even our usual, budgeted transfer fund.

I'll give Levy credit for now but come the January window when it will be clear where our deficiencies are I won't be listening to any excuses for not spending to rectify them. No "we already bought 7 players in the summer" or "players are too expensive at this time of year" bollocks. We keep falling just short because Levy has pennypinched and not given our managers the tools to finish the job and in the end it has cost us the Champions League on several occasions. This has been a very good window for us but I feel we have missed an opportunity to make it a great one.

We shouldn't have to give excuses. Levy is a business man first and he is running Spurs correctly which is do not over spend unlike a lot of other clubs. Also we have the new ground being built and that is going to take a lot of money but will help massively in the future for the club to really compete. For me i am amazingly happy with the purchases , we have bought some quality players in that except for soldado are all 25 and under roughly so it means they will be around for a while and AVB now has a very strong squad. No team is a one man team and i remember when we sold modric we really suffered to start with, without bale i don't think it will be that bad. Maybe you forget players like dempsey, siggurdson and adebayor scored goals against the top teams. It wasn't always bale.

 

[Glorykid]

Don't forget Fryers, he looked decent at LB he looks pacy, he is a unit and seemingly can cross the ball.

I think he could be.....could be the answer long term

I think we have had a fantastic window.

 

[fatpiranha]

We shouldn't have to give excuses. Levy is a business man first and he is running Spurs correctly which is do not over spend unlike a lot of other clubs. Also we have the new ground being built and that is going to take a lot of money but will help massively in the future for the club to really compete. For me i am amazingly happy with the purchases , we have bought some quality players in that except for soldado are all 25 and under roughly so it means they will be around for a while and AVB now has a very strong squad. No team is a one man team and i remember when we sold modric we really suffered to start with, without bale i don't think it will be that bad. Maybe you forget players like dempsey, siggurdson and adebayor scored goals against the top teams. It wasn't always bale.

I'm confused as to why you quoted my post . You seem to have taken the word 'excuses' out of it (and that out of context) and little all else. I am very happy with this window however I wasn't happy with the last 2 winter windows when we failed to address our weaknesses and ended up a 1pt off CL qualification in each of the past 2 seasons. There's another £50M towards the stadium that we missed out on. We were penny wise but pound stupid. That failure to invest cost us a lot more in the future. In the end we paid the going rate for a striker (Soldado) when we could have got him cheaper last winter but wouldn't pay the price. Not only did we end up paying more but we missed out on £25M of CL money which would also have had the knock on effect of making it easier to attract our targets.

I wasn't knocking Levy for this window but hoping he learns from past mistakes and doesn't fail to rectify any obvious weaknesses in the squad in January.

 

[Gilzeanking]

Not got a lot to add to general comments here re the ins and outs of players , hope some of them turn out well ,we have to wait and see . Its in the following area that we've also learned something from this window .

Yes ,a successful window given Bale's determination to leave . There's been some fan manipulation imo . It seems possible that the Bale deal was largely done early and that the forthcoming money was spent on players before he 'left' . The endless ITK about not needing the Bale money in order to buy these players looks to have been deliberate misinformation . We have ITKs working closely with the club it would appear ...operating as covert PR . This has become clearer recently

Not saying this is a bad thing necessarily , but personally I'd prefer not to be manipulated in this manner . Its a part of ITK output that often gets overlooked (being info designed by official sources to mislead). Its widely understood that previous regimes have managed fan attitudes with disinformation re transfer information and this practice would appear to be continuing .

...As would the practice of not spending money from club savings . This TW being no aberration from normal Spurs TW practice then.

Not really complaining , rather making a note to remember in future that ITK info may have many sides to it and club manipulation of ITK is obviously one of them .

 

[SamR]

We have had a fantastic window. There are some places in the squad which we will need to strengthen over time...but it's the first time that I can remember having a first 11 where anyone in the match day squad could fit in and we wouldn't look much weaker.

I have a feeling that Chiriches could feature more once we see him play. All of the new boys have a job to do and it will be interesting to see how they get on once they have had time together.

We have a good chance of finishing top 4. We can match the big boys across a season now and I'm.hopeful our season will be successful.

Role on Norwich!

 

[barry]

Does anyone rate Rose??
I think he's looked competent, and given time could be pretty damn good. Physically he has it all, and with a bit of work on his positioning could be a valuable player for us. He's still young, and seems to have a good work ethic. I think he'll be good. I suppose all we can do is wait and see

 

[SteveH]

You can't isolate any one window and say good or bad as you have the use of hindsight.

Levy et al have made calls on players/financial outlay, some have worked and some have failed - thats what happens when you make decision, you win some you lose some.

We know little of the background to the preceding windows except what we glean in the various media utterings, so very little.

I dare say there thing Levy would do differently in hindsight.

Like the way Spurs do business not perfect but look at financial clout of main competitors, daunting!

 

[SteveH]

Does anyone rate Rose??
I think he's looked competent, and given time could be pretty damn good., Physically he has it all and with a bit of work on his positioning could be a valuable player for us. He's still young, and seems to have a good work ethic. I think he'll be good. I suppose all we can do is wait and see

Yes

Spot on

 

[Wardy]

As above, Rose will be quality, just needs time.

I think Erikson is going to be class. I'm still shocked no-one else went in for him. I just hope he's the next VDV for us, fill that void missing in my life

 

[StartingPrice]

Now that the dust has settled, it seems that we still have Lennon, so those who were making up imaginary team-sheets minus the penguin-running one where being a tad hasty.
It also seems that, much against expectations, we have Defoe and, should he choose to reintegrate and use him, Adebayor, and a certain Octopus love.

Remembering that AVB prefers a 4-3-3, but has shown a willingness to learn, and that including switching formation, including 4-3-3, I would have to say that losing Bale to have the options we have while making a profit and not damaging the wage structure (no matter which unnecessary players the Goons have bought while ignoring their problems) looks like a good spring-board to the future:

Lloris/Friedel/Gomes

Walker/Naughton

Kaboul/Dawson/Vertonghen/Chiriches

Rose/Fryers

Sandro/Capoue

Paulinho/Dembélé

Ericksen/Holtby

Chadli/Lamela/Lennon/Townsend

Soldado/Defoe/Adebayor

That looks to me like a much better balanced and deeper squad that we had last season and, I suspect, than we would have had if we had insisted on keeping an unhappy Bale at the club. Yes, there are some areas that could do with strengthening, but I would most definitely consider that as a successful window (obviously, if 5 of those 7 players don't gel/completely flop it won't have been)

Oops, well I'd imagine they'd have something to do with nipple clamps and those vacuum jug things* that you see occasionaly on websites of ill repute.



* If you don't know what these are, you'll probably want to keep it that way.

:giggle:

 

[Spursidol]

IMO the title of the thread could be misleading - it should be to compare the squad at the end of last season and the squad now.

In addition to the 7 signings we have Townsend and Rose back from loan and could also claim bith Kaboul and Sandro are 'like new signings' as they missed the whole of last season or half the season respectively - a total of 11 players in.

By position the changes are :

In v Out

LB : Rose v BAE - If BAE cannot pass medicals, then a fit young LB who has played a PL season as one of Sunderlands best players is not that bad a deal. Hopefully Rose will improve by playing with better players, and by January AVB will have decided if he wants to bring in a more experienced LB. Having a fit player is probably an improvement though even if we are (like last season) dependent on Vertonghen and Naughton as cover.

CB - Trade an old Gallas and a young relatively inexperienced Caulker for Chiriches who looks a great ball playing CB - but only later this season will we tell if the Caulker for Chirchies trade was an improvement. Unclear if improvement.

Central Mid - Trading a slow Huddlestone, Parker, a one dimentional DM Livermore and an inexperienced Carroll (on loan) for Capoue, Paulhino is a big improvement in quality - andf with Dembele, Sandro and Holtby we are not short of numbers.

Attacking Midfielders - Trading an almost world class Bale for two of the best young attacking midfielde prospects in the world in Lamela and Eriksen plus Chadli and Townsend. That's a huge increase in attacking midfield options of definite class versus the risk that Bale might be injured for some matches. If Lamela and Eriksen live up to their form at Roma and Ajax, our attacking midfield has to be an improvement over Bale.

Strikers - Soldado v Dempsey....hmm not sure we need to wait for BC's comments. Soldado wins hands down as an improvement.


So without considering Sandro and Kaboul coming back from injury, I would suggest we have imporoved our striking, attacking midfield, central midfield and possibly our defensive optiions this summer.

Its not a perfect squad - but undoubtadly stronger than the end of last season.

 

[jezz]

All positives about the transfers.
Lamela is my pick.
He was only 20 last year and scored 15 for Roma, the boy has it all. Pace, skill and can score too
Watch his completion on you tube you will see the next Gareth Bale and better.
Ericksonn wow another gem. his link up with hopefully holtby, lamela and solado will terrify the best defences anywhere.
All the signings look like they are ball players and comfortable with it.
i would like to see for the next game against norwich
loris
vert, kaboul, rose and walker.
sandro, paulhino
erickson holtby lamela
solado

we need as many points as possible for the first 10, 15 games while the team settles.
6 out 9 is a great start.

 

[Pedro]

Voted Franco because he made all these signings possible.

Anyway, if we did get a left back, left winger and another striker then Franco would have nothing to do in January or next summer. Imagine what he could do with a year to prepare rather than only a couple of months

Player wise I would go with Lamela, out of hope more than anything else. Probably has the most potential to become a superstar, closely followed by eriksen. May take a year or two for both to fully blossom though. Paulinho will probably make the most impact THIS season.

 

[Pedro]

Lol, how did I guess that Yonoots made the single vote for Chiriches. Loving your commitment fella. Long term he could be, you never know.

TBH all have the potential, may come down to who wants it the most.

BTW Yonoots, thanks for all your thoughts and info on vlad this summer, much appreciated

 

[panoma]

This window was a big success for us, now AVB need to bring the best out of Ade again and hopefully get our team to gel fast and we will be a force in all competitions.

This is minor but think we should have tried to get Gylfi a good premier loan to a team like Swansea so he could take points from our rivals, and also get playing time since i fear that he will struggle to get any kind of playing time for us and would hate to see such a likeable lad going backwards in his development.

The same is true for Harry Kane, he should be out on loan to a good championchip side. He will be great for our u21 side, but he needs tougher competition.

Gomes should be off our wage list by now, but guess we had the same issue as with Ade that he dont really wanna move and no one wanna pay their wages as they are to big.