*Transfer Window 2014/15 Season Rumours/Signings *AKA Man U fans listing every player under the Sun

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Man U irrelevant, however much they spend it's a rebuilding and improving season, there is almost zero chance they would win even if they spent 400mil, it takes time for a bunch of players, regardless of how good they are, to become a team.

Man C, they have weaknesses that they've been unwilling to address and will be pushing harder for europe next season. They haven't addressed CB and getting a top notch third cb as back up, Sagna is a poor signing, waste of money for them. Where City lack is true wide players, even the first league title they were playing Tevez and Balotelli wide often. Silva isn't a wide player, Nasri isn't great out wide. They lack people like Di Maria/Ronaldo, wide players with epic delivery who can beat men and offer an incredibly pacey threat/support from the wings.

But they don't really show signs of replacing or adding players who would realistically start ahead of Nasri/Silva.

Chelsea though, Matic with a half season under his belt, him who I can't spell having improved ridiculously last season at left back. Chelsea lacked a truly great central mid and a truly great striker and look to have addressed both of those issues as well. A real striker and Fabregas playing instead of Ramires and that is a ludicrously good starting 11. Only issue is then Mourinho and his over defensiveness, he fluked a couple big wins and threw away points for draws, even with a great team those same tactics can cost a lot of points.
 
Lord-Jaffa said:
Fellaini looking like a bargin then if Cesc goes for 27mil.
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Barca utterly nuts for getting rid of him, you move on good players to bring in great players, that is fine. or underperforming players for great players, but getting rid of the second best player in the team to bring in the latest flavour of the month who isn't as good is just stupid.

Iniesta and Xavi have over the past three years underperformed in general, Iniesta had one stand out season but was poor this year and 3 years ago, Xavi has since his just epic season in something like 08-09, gotten a little worse every year and hasn't been good enough in the past two years. Barca letting history and fans dictate a move. It's that "we were great 5 years ago so if we go back to that team or as close as possible... we'll be great again", ignoring the change in the players since then. Daft.

How they've let Valdes leave as well, mental. Particularly as bad as that defence is, Valdes is by a margin the best keeper around, he saved Barca's awful defence time and time and time again. I'd hand him 300k a week to stay, as important to that side as Messi is due to how dodgy the defence has become.

Teams should be killing themselves to sign Valdes. Liverpool, Arsenal, Dortmund, Real(always good to see a big name defect to the other side), Atletico should all be throwing money at him. de Gea is great and has many years to improve further and Courtois/Cech is a ludicrously strong pair of keepers for next season so neither team should be desperate to sign him.
 
@drunkenmaster

Barca are getting rid of Fabregas for Rakitic, not exactly downgrading are they?

Better player and cheaper too, win win situation for a team who so desperately want rid of a player.
 
Dimi said:
@drunkenmaster

Barca are getting rid of Fabregas for Rakitic, not exactly downgrading are they?

Better player and cheaper too, win win situation for a team who so desperately want rid of a player.
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Better in so much as, Fabregas scores and assists more? Everyone is all over Rakitic being brilliant suddenly..... based off pretty much a europa league final. In which he only stood out because everyone was a bit crap.

he looks decent, maybe even very good, but Fabregas is noticeably better and he's proved it season after season after season.

Koke has potential and is surprisingly young and has improved his goal/assist output in the last year, but he still isn't on Fabregas's level. However if he keeps improving he might be in a couple of seasons.

Iniesta is massively over rated by most, Fabregas has the same amount of assists over 3 years(well 1 less, but Fabregas has been the same each year, Iniesta had one lucky/stand out year and two crap ones), while Fabregas has scored 30 more goals, or 150% more goals(19 vs 49) over three years. Rakitic over the same time frame scored around 26, with around 30 assists vs Fabregas's 49.

If Barca want to sell someone badly under performance and massively over rated who they could get great money for, Fabregas is pretty much bottom of the list while Iniesta would be top. Considering he takes significantly more shots than Fabregas does yet scores dramatically less.

Rakitic is also a set piece taker, regardless of the club you are at when you take freekicks/corners, then your assist/scoring stats are usually increased significantly. Fabregas takes neither at Barca(well the odd corner, but certainly not the main guy and almost never takes free kicks or pens).
 
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Shamikebab said:
Exactly, one title. Then in the seasons following we're left in a weaker position. It's better than the rumoured Robben interest but it's still a few years too late to make it worth it.
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Once we've got LvG as manager and we're back in the top 4 next season (hopefully), we'll have a better pick of players.

He'll have just turned 31 for the start of the 2015/16 season, is it not possible to be a good midfielder at that age? Of course it is.

I see no downside to signing Schweinsteiger, at all. Not that I think it's likely at the moment, but the link is encouraging.
 
Robbo said:
Once we've got LvG as manager and we're back in the top 4 next season (hopefully), we'll have a better pick of players.

He'll have just turned 31 for the start of the 2015/16 season, is it not possible to be a good midfielder at that age? Of course it is.

I see no downside to signing Schweinsteiger, at all. Not that I think it's likely at the moment, but the link is encouraging.
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The potential for another u21 player to leave because with this signing there are fewer squad places available for 1/2/3 years? There are a few promising youngsters coming through - and no one wants another Pogba situation ( although I happily admit he appeared to be a little too arrogant before he left for that stage of his career)

Is it worth the risk? For a 26-28 year old its easier to argue for the older player, but getting in a
30 year old ( by the time he starts a game) its a very hard call.

The other question is if Utd do go fpr him, have they thrown out their policy for 1 year rolling contracts for over 30 yo's - because surely no one would make any similar move for potentially a single season ( and will it therefore make it difficult for all other negotiations with similarly aged players?).
 
FrankJH said:
The potential for another u21 player to leave because with this signing there are fewer squad places available for 1/2/3 years? There are a few promising youngsters coming through - and no one wants another Pogba situation ( although I happily admit he appeared to be a little too arrogant before he left for that stage of his career)

Is it worth the risk? For a 26-28 year old its easier to argue for the older player, but getting in a
30 year old ( by the time he starts a game) its a very hard call.

The other question is if Utd do go fpr him, have they thrown out their policy for 1 year rolling contracts for over 30 yo's - because surely no one would make any similar move for potentially a single season ( and will it therefore make it difficult for all other negotiations with similarly aged players?).
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If this, if that. If he's available and wants to join, we need him. We have to get top 4 next season.
 
FrankJH said:
The potential for another u21 player to leave because with this signing there are fewer squad places available for 1/2/3 years? There are a few promising youngsters coming through - and no one wants another Pogba situation ( although I happily admit he appeared to be a little too arrogant before he left for that stage of his career)

Is it worth the risk? For a 26-28 year old its easier to argue for the older player, but getting in a
30 year old ( by the time he starts a game) its a very hard call.

The other question is if Utd do go fpr him, have they thrown out their policy for 1 year rolling contracts for over 30 yo's - because surely no one would make any similar move for potentially a single season ( and will it therefore make it difficult for all other negotiations with similarly aged players?).
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I swear the only two idiotic clubs with this policy(for basically everyone) is/was Wenger and Fergie, but they are two of the only managers around who were managing early in the 90's, in particular in england where player health wasn't remotely a priority till the very late 90's. Meaning they essentially learned/felt on the job that most players crap out around 30, but I think that is pretty old style thinking. Guys becoming injury prone or running out of steam at 30 in 90-2005 would have still spent the majority of their playing time as kids, youth players, reserves then first team training and eating like crap. It's a needless and stupid assumption to make that a player over 30 is a big risk.

He's MUCH better than anything you have in midfield by a mile. Get rid of Carrick and and you are effectively reducing the age of the midfield not increasing it, while massively increasing the quality of players in there.

Also fact is that Pogba would most likely have been far less willing to leave Utd for first team chances if the starting midfielders were much older than much younger.

As a 18year old player hoping to replace a central midfielder, and realising you might have to wait, would you think that would happen sooner with a 31 year old midfielder ahead of you, or a 26 yr old midfielder ahead of you?

The simple fact is, if a 17-22yr old player is good enough they'll get starts, if not, they won't, the age of the people ahead of them is irrelevant, only quality matters. Pogba wasn't being played ahead of the likes of Carrick, old and utterly awful, and Anderson, not old or young, still crap, and Cleverley, young and crap. Pogba should have gotten games, he was good enough and better than players any age in the positions he could play. Fergie made a massive mistake not giving him chances AND not moving on Carrick/Anderson.

Pogba left because he wasn't given a chance, not because of the age of other players.
 
drunkenmaster said:
Barca utterly nuts for getting rid of him, you move on good players to bring in great players, that is fine. or underperforming players for great players, but getting rid of the second best player in the team to bring in the latest flavour of the month who isn't as good is just stupid.

Iniesta and Xavi have over the past three years underperformed in general, Iniesta had one stand out season but was poor this year and 3 years ago, Xavi has since his just epic season in something like 08-09, gotten a little worse every year and hasn't been good enough in the past two years. Barca letting history and fans dictate a move. It's that "we were great 5 years ago so if we go back to that team or as close as possible... we'll be great again", ignoring the change in the players since then. Daft.
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DM, i think it's more of a case that Fab is a sellable asset for Barca after the whole Neymar fiasco. Barca obviously want to incorporate a more direct approach into their game, there's no doubt they had become of a bit a one trick pony last few seasons. The PL is proving that CM's that sit can play well into their mid 30's and later. Rakitic has come in for a fraction of the cost. It's good business really as Fab is never going to displace Xavi or Iniesta. You can't replace club legends that still have the legs, that's the reality of it. Fab will be back at Barca when he hits 30 anyway probably. I'm sure there won't be any bitterness..

Edit, is it actually been stated he's leaving? I've seen a few bits with Pique or something..but apart from that is it set in stone?
 
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Fabregas out scores, out assists and plays more games than either Iniesta or Xavi. Xavi's insane season of over 30 assists was around 6 years ago, he's not that player any more, he's still good but we're talking about him providing a fraction of that today. He doesn't impose himself on games and he, it's not that he doesn't not have the legs, he just isn't as good as he was. Iniesta was over rated at his best and is no where near his best. Fabregas outperforms both in 9/10 games, so yes getting rid of either would make more sense.

Iniesta gets huge acclaim for scoring the winner in the world cup, but Fabregas is the guy that got assists in three finals for Spain and was their most important player in at least two of those tournaments, again outscoring/out assisting them in general.

Rakitic supposedly cost £20-25mil, so it's hardly minimal and he's had, at 26 years old, one stand out season in spain and even then it wasn't brilliant. As above 99% of the time a clubs main corner/freekick/penalty taker will get noticeably more goals/assists than someone else who does none of those things, Rakitic won't take freekicks or penalties at Barca, and a fairly meagre 12 goals 10 assists, where I saw at least 3-4 of the assists came from corners/freekicks and likely a few goals.... take them out and he had an average season.

Fabregas's numbers are great as he doesn't take freekicks, while Xavi takes quite a lot and Iniesta takes some.

Iniesta is a more sellable asset due to how over rated he is. I bet City/PSG/Bayern/Monaco would pay significantly more for him than Fabregas.

The Neymar fiasco is just that though, original said to be about 50mil, then they said he was 90mil but they'd magically be nice and pay an extra 10mil in tax. They have seemingly been found guilty of trying to evade tax on the deal and could be fined up to 50mil. If Neymar ends up costing them 150mil, when they also gave him a wage that apparently upset Messi in how big it was.... worst deal ever.
 
drunkenmaster said:
Iniesta gets huge acclaim for scoring the winner in the world cup, but Fabregas is the guy that got assists in three finals for Spain and was their most important player in at least two of those tournaments, again outscoring/out assisting them in general.
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Did he? You haven't mentioned that for a good five minutes, perhaps it should be your signature.
 
Iniesta ppays a pivotal role though outside of scoring and assists too. He can twist and turn on the ball out ftom defence and create space and make q great pass after doing so. Like Scholes could jink and turn to unlock a few yards. Iniesta does that and then really exploits the space he creates. You can't take anything away from Iniesta and proclaim he should be sold.
 
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