Out of interest, who are these better, more experienced options out there for not much more than £40m?
My primary choice would be Kone, but Viega, Gravenberch.. I still think Amrabat would be a good signing, all of those would be less or around the 40m price, hell given the choice of Tielemans for next to nought or 40m on Lavia, I'd rather Tielemans. 40m for Lavia is ridiculous.
I think there is still better value abroad, the 2 french lads we've been linked won't cost a huge amount more than 40 million. Neves just went for 47million, again a not to dissimilar price. As tombstone says above Viega from celta vigo has a b.o. clause less than 40 by all accounts
Blows my mind that Rice is going to go for £100m+
Aye, 100 million or no deal.
I've barely seen anything of Kone either but he's hardly more proven than Lavia - he's got a few more games under his belt but in a far inferior League where he's hardly set the world alight by all accounts. Neither Viega or Gravenberch are defensive mids and Amrabat's agent has been whoring him out for the past 12 months with nobody interested, which is quite telling. That applies to Tielemans too. I know you're a fan but no top side wanted him, even on a free. I presume it's because any club that was looking at him realised he only turns up 2 or 3 times per season and the rest of the time he's pretty ****. He's not a defensive midfielder either.
Kone has over 4 times as many senior games than Lavia. Not really "a few". Almost 100 more senior games.
According to a quick check of transfermarkt, Kone's played approx 6000 more minutes of senior football than Lavia - assuming 45 games per season that equates to around 1.5 seasons of football more. Given that Lavia's played all his football in the PL, rather than a far inferior League, I'm not sure how that makes him more proven. The 1.5 seasons worth of football is no more valuable than the PL experience of Lavia has. I'm sorry but I fail to see how Kone is any more proven than Lavia would be - they would both be calculated gambles on potential rather than safe bets.
Ok, so let me make a couple of assumptions here and ask a question. Firstly I will assume from what I know of you that you arent arguing for arguments sake, I'll also assume from what I know of you that you are approaching this from a position of logic.
No, I don't think £40m for Lavia is a particularly good deal but I queried your point that suggested that there are obviously better deals out there. I honestly fail to see who we could/should sign that's going to be obviously a much better deal than £40m for Lavia. The price of anybody half decent is £70m+ (which is mad) and the alternatives are equally unproven players for not too dissimilar fees. If we shouldn't go anywhere near Lavia because of the value of the deal then I'm not sure who we are going to sign for similar reasons.
I'm fine with that, everything after the "particularly good deal" is moot. We're on the same page, its not a good deal and one that we shouldnt be doing. That actually puts us more in alignment this summer than you and I were last summer when we had very different views on our midfield transfers situation, so thats progress !
We're in alignment in terms of agreeing that there's little value out there in regards to midfielders (which thankfully there was with Mac Allister) however where we differ is I don't believe we can afford not to sign x because the price is ott.I'm fine with that, everything after the "particularly good deal" is moot. We're on the same page, its not a good deal and one that we shouldnt be doing. That actually puts us more in alignment this summer than you and I were last summer when we had very different views on our midfield transfers situation, so thats progress !
I'll take the agreement that 40m for Lavia is not a good deal. Thats good enough for me
