What I ment was the original plan, if Mo was leaving was 6 months getting his fitness issues addressed and fixed, then the 2nd half of the season, start using him whilst we still had Mo for 6 months, similar to how we brought Diaz in January to replace Mane but had them both for 6 months. The only difference this time was Chiesa was available earlier.
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Well for one, it doesnât take much for a player to change his mind the longer negotiations drag on, talk is one thingâŚaction and putting things in writing is another.
It also becomes a bother and a distraction knowing other teams can start talks with them with us helpless to do anything about it, there is no good reason to let a key player enter the last 6 months of his contract. None.
There is good reason if theyâre 32 and 33 respectively otherwise you risk what happened with Henderson.
Even now itâs a huge gamble by the club to make not one but two players of that age your highest earners. Would have loved it to be sorted sooner but if the club wanted to ensure there was no early signs of physical decline then so be it. Feels like a lesson learned rather than a mistake made.
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You canât sell him, because he doesnât want to move (yet). Signing on bonus for moving âon a freeâ.
Him wanting a lot more money than youâre willing to pay.
Him wanting a longer contract than youâre willing to provide.
Thereâs three. Youâre a moron.
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What are you talking about?
Seems like you have trouble comprehending the longer you stall, the more control a player has, thus the higher the demands are likely to be and in effect the greedier the agent becomes (take Trent as an example).
If reports are right and Mo and Virg will now be on 450k and 400k a week for the next 2 years then weâre no better off now than we wouldâve been if this was done 6-12 months ago, meaning dragging this on until now was all for nothing.
Except 6-12 months ago they may have been demanding more than thatâŚ
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Yep, a cheap punt on a player with enormous upside whoâs presence gave us some options for how to handle the Salah situation in 6 months or a year if things go south with his contract discussion. That earmarked role meant we, and he, had the luxury of giving him an out of competition style training program to rebuild his fitness in a way he needed but was not able to do at Juve after his big injury. This is a sort of training that is focused only on how his body is responding without the complexity of having to scale it back at a certain time of the week to allow him to be recovered for the game on the weekend.
I think it is surprised everyone how little heâs played even in the second half of the season, and moving forward it may well not work out for him, especially now the Mo issue is resolved. But for most of the season the explanation for his absence was clearly articulated by the club and under those circumstance pretty understandable.
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Weâre literally better off having not paid them both their higher wages for an extra 12 months.
You call it dragging on, I bet the club are more than happy at biding their time and being more confident in their decision than had they made it 12 months ago.
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What is the Almightygob crying about now. Jeez this season has been traumatic for him it not been a disaster.
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As @redfanman has already pointed out, who knows what their âdemandsâ were 6-12 months ago. Maybe theyâve come down from what they wanted, money or duration of contract.
Plus, as @rab pointed out, weâve likely saved additional wages, as theyâd have been on the higher rate from the time they signed.
Would you like me to ask @gasband to draw you some pictures to make it easier for you to understand?
I really get it that Chiesa could have played more this season but Slot hasnât been the type to rotate much and, for the most part, he has been rewarded for playing what he feels is his strongest all the time.
There is little evidence to/against the idea that this is a reflection of Hughes buying players that Slot doesnât want. If the necessity of the situation (Salah out for an extended period) existed, I believe Chiesa or Elliott would have played substantially more and probably done a decent job.
They probably could not have delivered the same sort of output as Salah but that is why they arenât playing and why they are only backup.
No point in criticizing a player for not being Salah, or Hughes for not finding another player of Salahâs quality that could be rotated in at a heartbeat.
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12 months ago Klopp left and we had a new manager, who in their right mind would commit to us with no certainty of how Slot would go.
6 months ago, still the same and we had started discussions plus we had to be certain that with both players being in their 30âs that their fitness was still good enough for an arduous season.
Wow. 13 points clear and about to win the league. You guys must be happy.
Not really. Iâm disappointed that injured lad we bought on a punt for ÂŁ10m from Italy didnât play more.
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This article on TIA seems to indicate that he just isnât up to the expected standard:
Clearly, if he isnât going to get game time, then he needs to move on for everyoneâs benefit.
yeah, but its by Jack Lusby though 
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Jack Lusby gets a lot of grief here for reasons unknown to me (they might have been divulged but I havenât got across them) but I think that TIA as a whole has veered off the course, so much that is now resembles a glorified Twitter aggregator accounts that just copy and paste stuff from journalists who break actual exclusive news. I canât remember when I first started following the site, might have been twenty years ago, before Twitter existed, but I completely stopped following them a few months ago for this reason - and that with a genuine sadness.
As for Chiesaâs future, almost everything is possible for him. He might stay, he might go, but one thing I donât think is possible is that his transfer turns into a success. He doesnât look like someone who can cut it in PL and his coach doesnât fully trust him, it seems.
I think @rab pointed out yesterday that club saved a yearâs worth of wages on Van Dijk and Salah - well, Chiesaâs transfer is where those savings probably went down the drain. Iâm not blaming the player but clubâs hierarchy trying to outsmart the ever savvy Italian clubs. Letâs hope Hughes can find him a new club, the right club, so he can have a successful career because he looks like a decent lad.
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He writes with the rigor of someone who can only exist as a journalist in the digital age where editorial oversight is non-existent and something is considered worthwhile as long as it gets clicks.
But yeah, Lusbyâs piece is just a regurgitation of comments from David Lynch who himself is not treating this as news just his attempts at reading tea leaves
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We took a punt, it hasnât worked out. Probably cost us ÂŁ18-ÂŁ20m with fee, agents and wages. If we could get ÂŁ15m back this summer and the wages off the books Iâd take that.
Feels like a gamble that was worth taking. More so than say loaning Sterling. They might have only spent ÂŁ5m on his wages but theyâll be giving him back to Chelsea at the end of the season. Weâll at least have a saleable asset if we can get an Inter, AC, Napoli type to cough up a modest enough fee. Or dare I say tempt some Saudi team to pay through the nose.
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Thing is Chiesa was not getting much game time at Juve, a bad version of Juve, playing in a league where Scott McTominay is a superstar and the spearhead of a title charge.
He was worth a punt, give him 6 months and get his fitness back, kick the tires, see if we have something. So far it seems like weâve done that and Slot hasnât been impressed by what he sees.
Not every transfer has to be a roaring success - but if signing Chiesa meant that Doak was able to go on loan, where he has been developing nicely until his injury, then I think we take that.
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Yes, we are going to win the league. Thatâs amazing. It doesnât mean that everything is perfect and quite frankly seeing certain posters having a go at anyone who thinks otherwise is getting really fucking tiresome.
Thanks, I missed this one. Obviously, if what Lynch is saying is true, then I have a humble pie to eat. It doesnât read though as if itâs anything more than his own interpretation and not a relay of actual news from within the club.
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