OhForAGreavsie

And so they will too.

It'll be at a discount in January, not a premium.

You to explain the transfer process to them? It is all so easy for you, and given that you love the club just as much as any of us, don't you think it's time you offered to help them out? They might talk big, but deep down they'd probably appreciate it.

Then do it I say.

I really like Morata and would love to have him here. So much so that I'm increasingly in favour of a 3-5-2 to accommodate him. You are however right, both in fact and in principle. The stat that this player, or that player, won a particular point is among the silliest claims made by the number crunchers. Premier League clubs need to pause for a moment and consider how they are hurting their league with their spending habits. Madrid's decision to bring Morata back was, in my view, a purely money making exercise. If they succeed in selling a player they don't really want for £80m, a player they clearly do not believe will hurt them if he joins a potential CL opponent, then how are our clubs ever going to close the gap to the Spanish Giants? Such spending only bolsters the selling team's ability to out compete us. The money we pay to them subsidises their wages and transfer budgets. I have believed for years that premier League clubs should stop competing on transfer fees, and compete harder on wages instead. An interesting league, featuring popular, competitive football is an attractive prospect. Top that up with £300,000 - £400,000pw and the better players, the ones who mostly prefer the continental giants at the moment, will be more likely to want to make a fuss to join our clubs. We'll have a better chance to get the absolute cream and we'll stop subsidising overseas clubs ability to match the wages we pay. Consider Morata. If we tempt the player with a starting spot and £300,000pw, the chances are he would not have returned to Madrid in the first place, but, since he has, there is now a big fee to pay them. When amortised over five years, the difference between a £40m fee, and an £80m fee is an extra £160,000pw. Are £300,000pw - £400,000pw wages feasible? For the right players they are, yes. The Premier League got rich, but it has not yet found the courage to get smart. Any PL club wanting to claim the £153,000,000 prize, doesn't have to run faster than the monsters in Munich, Madrid, Milan and elsewhere, it just has to run faster than the other teams in Manchester, London and Liverpool. So what if a club is stocked up with overpriced, middling players? As long as their overpriced players are better than their national competitors overpriced players what do they care? Maybe the 16% drop in TV viewing figures will help them find the courage to stop taking the easy way out.

If Roma attempt to sell you Belotti, check the paperwork very carefully.

Especially at Barca.

The first thing which some people here simply refuse to accept is that selling clubs in this situation DO NOT NAME A PRICE. Conspiracy theories apart, Juve's only interest, if they have to part with Sandro, is to maximise his price. Naming a figure is counter productive to that so they won't do it. What sellers attempt to do instead is tease escalating bids out of the would be buyer, and keep doing that until they genuinely believe there will be no further bids. Only then will they decide if that bid suits them or not. One tactic sellers use to to indicate that only bids north of £x will be considered. Then they receive a bid of £x +1 and announce that it isn't 'northward' enough. The most reliable way sellers can be sure that the have genuinely received the maximum bid is to drag the 'negotiation' out until deadline day. Barring that, they have to read the signals coming from the buyer and make a judgement. That's not likely to be a painful error for Juve if they read it wrong in this case however, since they do not want to sell and they don't need the money. Would be buyers interests are clearly not served by dragging negotiations out so they have to consider the way they approach negations. There is no sense in bidding £x on Monday, £x +1 on Tuesday then expecting £x +2 to be accepted on Wednesday. If sellers can encourage increased bids out of you so easily, why should they stop encouraging? Rapidly increasing bids just convince sellers that there is plenty more where that came from. Buyers therefore have to finesse their behaviour and sometimes delay before upping their offer. Only three circumstances are possible with this deal. It has been done but the clubs have agreed not to announce it, it is still under discussion, or it is dead. I don't think any of us here know which.

Speaking just of the rumoured swap deal with Arsenal. I don't believe it at all. I just don't see Nemanja as an Arsene Wenger player. If that deal really is on the table then take it , unless... We face an either/or situation where both Arsenal & Juve insist it's Matic or no deal. The preference obviously would be to involve Nemanja in one of the deals and pay cash for the other, but, if we have to choose, I suppose do business with Juve and find another solution for RWB. I'd really like The Ox here though.

Cause and effect? The goal, let us not forget, is to win. We should promote youth only in as much as doing so helps us achieve that goal. Few people here follow the development sides as closely as I do, but selecting academy graduates is not an end in itself.

And how the hell do you know what Juve wanted two or three weeks ago? This kind of post, this kind of thinking, is really irritating.

Do I remember correctly that @TheWiz lives in Austria? At least Turin is a little closer if he should want to watch Nemanja play live. Meanwhile, if our Serbian should join the Italian champions, I hope in won't mean TheWiz leaves this forum.

Barring one brilliant assist in the baby Euros this year, I have not seen anything which causes me to believe in this lad. His young player of the tournament award at the last proper Euros was an indictment either of the judgement of those who voted, or on the quality of the other under 20's at the tournament. If it wasn't for the hype which surrounded him because he had just joined Bayern, and because Portugal won, I don't believe he'd have been selected. Based on what I've seen, I hope that if Chelsea's squad builders do select him, it is definitely on loan only.

A crucial factor. It should never be forgotten or underestimated. In fact, the importance of such leadership is the only reason Jose brought Didier back. The only good one anyway.

@CaptainConte is providing an interesting, and useful, perspective on several situations. Not to mention the odd translation service now and again. He is a very welcome guest.

Surely all Chelsea fans want that but the priority for me is always the league. On topic; I like Rudi & believe he'll help us in every phase of play. Good signing.

No one who saw it could ever forget it I think. Nor will I ever forget the post match comments of the Schalke coach. Not a single one of his team, he said, would have any chance of getting into that Chelsea line up and, as you pointed out, Sane was in his team that day. This passage of play does though contain a glimpse of an area in which Ruben needs to improve. Having been commenting on this for the last 5 years however, I can't justify being optimistic that the penny will drop. People often observe that Ruben is defensively lazy but I don't really agree with that. My gripe is that he needs to be more active when we have the ball. There are often spells in games where Rubes barely touches the ball and makes no impact on the game whatsoever. He needs to be busier getting open, demanding the ball, affecting play, then getting open again. Notice how, after he has released the ball to Charly, Ruben immediately slackens his pace with a body language which says my work is done. I grant you this is not the worst example of this trait but I'd want to see him determinedly supporting the ball again. It doesn't matter how godd you are, if you don't get on the ball, the game will pass you by.

That's another word now. Are you sure we're not talking about the same occasion, and one or other of us is just misremembering the statement? I'm definitely remembering it being reported that he said a substantial offer, which is an entirely different meaning to suitable. In fact I've been praising Juve for an absolute master class in the way they've handled this negotiation. (From their point of view of course). If he was so stupid as to say suitable then I take it back.

Did he say that? If he did that would be interesting. So interesting that I can hardly believe he was careless enough to go on record with something so helpful to our negotiating position. It's similar to the widely reported "a substantial offer", comment that he's said to have made. Obviously 'substantial' is not the same as 'generous', and both words are different again from 'acceptable', which is the word that matters of course.

Yes he does. What can I tell you? You've seen the same performances I have. If the two of us have different assessments of what we've seen then there is no way to square that circle, but you asked the question and 'yes' is my answer to it.

Are you sure it isn't that the people who always preferred Morata, a group which includes me, are simply having more to say now? Have you seen people making comments which contradict what they were saying last week? I haven't, but then I don't always remember who said what.

That kind of arithmetic assumes we have nothing else to pay for. In fact our wage bill alone is way more than the TV revenue and the Nike deal added together.

If you were manager of our club we'd have thrown a party when you did.

Absolutely correct in every regard in my opinion.

Five paragraphs in and you finally get to the nub of it. 😊