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Tottenham Hotspur Karen Club....what do they do?

Ok, I take your view on how fantastic it is at the club but I don't agree with it. I don't use our previous owners as a barometer because quite frankly our current owners have had 17 years at the helm which is virtually a generation and they are working in an era that is unprecedented in terms of cash. Whilst I can congratulate them on a job well done in many aspects and don't doubt they are trying to do a good job, I can also look at the wider picture and not just regurgitate the good stuff. There have been failings as well and its equally correct to point that out. And this window is a failing imo. People can use the smokescreen of a 10 yr viewpoint on whether a transfer was a success, that's nonsense too. Quite often, certainly in our history, we will have been through 2-3 managers in that time so this longer term look to describe something as a success is not compatible with the game today when looking at a transfer. On that basis, do we wait another 8 years before declaring whether Janssen is a success?

The owners have done a great job to get us to this point but over the last 5-6 years they have needed to stick their neck out a little which wouldn't have sent us full Leeds if it didn't work but they haven't done so because they won't invest anything outside of the what the club makes and that will not cut it anymore. Anything they invest over and above they are gonna recoup in spades not just when they sell but if we perform to our very best and win the league as example. What we needed was 2-3 signings of sufficient quality, it wasn't looking for a Emirates Marketing Project-esque spend up but the fact is that the squad is not good enough depth wise to cover for when 2-3 players in the 11 have an off day.

As for the three players you suggested, I wouldn't have described that as a good window for the reasons you have said, we are buying potential which is wonderful and De Ligt and Sessegnon especially, should be very good players in 2-3 years time but that isn't what we need. We have been shortcutting with potential and wasting money on the likes of N'koudou and N'jie so I would have looked on the window as a good one if we had bought a mix of experience and potential or just experience. So flipping it slightly, if we had sold Rose, Alderweireld and Dembele but bought in Martial, Kovacic/Rabiot and De Ligt for example then now I'm saying that's a good window aside from losing Toby because its got youth but experience certainly in the first two and undoubted quality in all three and actually, with the transfers out taken into account, would that have been an extravagant net spend? Maybe a net spend of about £65/£70m for a team who have finished in the top 3 the last 3 years? Is that really a lot to ask? Would that even be really pushing the boat out? The club have made more money this last couple of years than ever before from gate receipts, merit awards and TV money. I get the Alderweireld/Rose deals would likely have triggered movement so them not happening will have had an effect on business but hold up any other business?

I hear everything you say about the ins being linked to the outs but that's poor planning too. The club is overloaded with players that need to be moved on but haven't been. Who is in charge of the transfers out? The chairman. He can't be praised when its good but get no criticism when its bad and the planning has been bad. The world cup, the early window finish etc...….they didn't come out of nowhere, we knew they were happening. Its like when people moan about Christmas coming up, it happens the same time every year, its not like it popped up out of the blue and you were unprepared. We should have been looking at ways of getting rid well before the seasons end if it was going to prevent us buying. I am sure we will buy players once those go but we shouldn't just be replacing, we should be enhancing the quality level in the squad, not selling quality and trying to replace that directly because they won't stay, we should be adding to them.

I really don't see how we get anywhere if the name of the game is to not waste money so we can replace a world class talent with a potential world class talent...…..just buy the potential to play with the world class. And on the wasting money, I agree, don't buy another N'jie just for the sake of it because £10m is a lot of money to our club but to say to me that we couldn't afford one of the 4 players, as an example, that I mentioned? I would like to know why given how much money is flying around to be honest and to that end, I don't have any issue with that question being asked by the trust or anyone else but no one likes hard questions because they ruffle feathers.

I don't know and you don't know if that was asked slightly prior to the window closing......absolutely no way of knowing tbh but Ive questioned the transfer window despite all these 'positives' that made it a 'good window' and I don't see how its window that isn't questionable quite frankly and to me, it isn't a good window overall and the most telling part about it is that the chairman probably knows it isn't a good window because he decided against his usual page on the website at the windows end.

Anyway, your thoughts are backed up by your rational thinking and your perception of the situation and my thoughts are backed up by my perceptions. You think it was a good window and I don't...…...You don't like the trust asking questions of the board or the manner they did it etc and I don't mind that they did it at all......its really that simple.

Look, I'm not saying it was necessarily a good window. But my personal thoughts (Rose out, Sess in, Toby out, De Ligt in, Dembele out, someone great in, Martial in) are just my personal thoughts. That's what, in an ideal world, I would have liked to happen.

I think the fact that we didn't sell players is a massive factor in everything else you are saying, but you are brushing it off. Yes, the transfer window was coming round and we all knew it. As did Levy. But knowing about it doesn't mean we can force other clubs to pay the money we want for them. Then it becomes dropping our price to sell them, and if we have to do that too much then it would be the wrong move to sell them. So I'm quite happy that, even if we didn't sign anyone at least we kept the experienced players we did have. The trend of there being little movement was something reflected through a lot of the clubs, due to the early window closing and Europe still being able to sign. It meant clubs were keen to stick with what they had rather than risk being caught short and forced into doing something by a Euro club that had the advantage of time. It would have been lovely if we had signed 4 great players, but even if we signed one or two, I don't know that it definitely improves us. And I don't know that one or two players is enough to stop the Trust writing a rubbish post, but maybe 4 is? Would one signing have been enough to stop them writing? 2? 3? 4? What was the right level that would have made it an acceptable transfer window, in the Trust's eyes?

That's kind of the point. We can all have our opinions on the window but we don't know the difficulties that not just our club, but all clubs faced in making signings. And the Trust, rather than trying to understand the club's position decided to take the view that the club were incompetent liars. They showed that they failed to understand the dynamics of the business they were trying to hold to account, and they made themselves look foolish.
 
over the last 5-6 years they have needed to stick their neck out a little which wouldn't have sent us full Leeds if it didn't work but they haven't done so because they won't invest anything outside of the what the club makes and that will not cut it anymore.

.

How do you explain away all the investment in infrastructure, from NHWL to the training ground, and the massive salaries for the likes of Kane? I hope you’ve got some good sleight of hand ranting to make them disappear.
 
Is that really what you honestly think? Do you not think a balance should be struck from paying a certain amount ticket wise and the owners actually putting their hand in their pocket for once? The club has a better chance of success if they actually went for a moderate + net spend, GHod knows they've made enough out of the club to be sent to the Bahamas to be washed and when they sell the club it will be at a massive profit. This is a separate argument though.

The new stadium didn't sell out in days, they were desperately still trying to flog tickets in early august. The 1882 tickets still had much to be sold in July and to this day I still don't know if everything sold. They got way down the ST list, it was hardly in as hot demand as they might have expected, I've got a friend who was over 60,000 on the list in May 2017, 39,000 on the list in May 2018 and he was offered a ST in July at the new ground. That amount of non take up will be for a variety of reasons but I would be willing to bet mainly it was down to money - the seats that were left were at too high a price point for many to think it was worth the effort.
The ticket price should be the absolute maximum it can be without negatively affecting sales. If that means I can no longer afford tickets, then so be it. I have no right to tickets and neither does anybody else - those who can afford them get them.

You only have to look back over the ticketing thread here to see that, although the stadium wasn't a complete sell out, most ticket batches had a majority sold very quickly. Due to people wanting seat choice, it's in the nature of tickets to slow as the choice dwindles. I don't think anyone could reasonably claim that the tickets were overpriced for commercial reasons. Emotional ones maybe, but they're irrelevant.
 
How do you explain away all the investment in infrastructure, from NHWL to the training ground, and the massive salaries for the likes of Kane? I hope you’ve got some good sleight of hand ranting to make them disappear.

How do I explain it? Its self funded by the earnings of the club. It isn't money they have spent themselves. They haven't put any of their own money into the club at all. The investment in the stadium will be converted to a mortgage as well.
 
Look, I'm not saying it was necessarily a good window. But my personal thoughts (Rose out, Sess in, Toby out, De Ligt in, Dembele out, someone great in, Martial in) are just my personal thoughts. That's what, in an ideal world, I would have liked to happen.

I think the fact that we didn't sell players is a massive factor in everything else you are saying, but you are brushing it off. Yes, the transfer window was coming round and we all knew it. As did Levy. But knowing about it doesn't mean we can force other clubs to pay the money we want for them. Then it becomes dropping our price to sell them, and if we have to do that too much then it would be the wrong move to sell them. So I'm quite happy that, even if we didn't sign anyone at least we kept the experienced players we did have. The trend of there being little movement was something reflected through a lot of the clubs, due to the early window closing and Europe still being able to sign. It meant clubs were keen to stick with what they had rather than risk being caught short and forced into doing something by a Euro club that had the advantage of time. It would have been lovely if we had signed 4 great players, but even if we signed one or two, I don't know that it definitely improves us. And I don't know that one or two players is enough to stop the Trust writing a rubbish post, but maybe 4 is? Would one signing have been enough to stop them writing? 2? 3? 4? What was the right level that would have made it an acceptable transfer window, in the Trust's eyes?

That's kind of the point. We can all have our opinions on the window but we don't know the difficulties that not just our club, but all clubs faced in making signings. And the Trust, rather than trying to understand the club's position decided to take the view that the club were incompetent liars. They showed that they failed to understand the dynamics of the business they were trying to hold to account, and they made themselves look foolish.

I'm not brushing off the fact we didn't sell anyone, I'm making the point that the buck stops with the chairman on that basis which I think is fair enough. If you are going praise him for the training ground and stadium then you can't say he doesn't deserve criticism on transfers, especially outs which are definitely his domain. Perhaps this summer he hasn't had his eye fully on the ball with everything going on or wants back what he paid etc. I partially agree with your stance in your largest paragraph. My own feelings are that perhaps something else is at play here, maybe the finances are worse than we know, maybe the stuff with the ground was always likely and they decided against biting the bullet on Wembley and these would've had a great impact on transfers. I don't know how many players would've made the trust happy, I don't think even they could tell you other than because we signed no one at all, it was a case of what's going on? I also don't look at it as a case of them accusing the board of being incompetent liars, that is a bit over the top in fairness - they asked a question based on what was said regarding ticketing providing funds for the transfer window.

You are right, we all have our opinions and none of us know fully of the complexities or not that will have affected things this summer. And we have had a back n forth debate that has not shouted the other person down because it isn't a populist view which I thank you for
 
How do I explain it? Its self funded by the earnings of the club. It isn't money they have spent themselves. They haven't put any of their own money into the club at all. The investment in the stadium will be converted to a mortgage as well.
They own the club. Every single penny of profit that gets invested (pretty much all of it) is from their pockets.
 
I think it was said that we have to compensate them for the reduced capacity and playing at a neutral venue. We give them a share of the gate receipts in the cups and because we can't play at Wembley or the New ground but at a neutral venue we have to compensate them for the loss of revenue. Not sure how its calculated given you don't know how many tickets we would have sold in either place but we do have to give them money.
Doesn't sound right, if we only sold 25k at Wembley.or whl we don't pay them for the capacity.
 
How do I explain it? Its self funded by the earnings of the club. It isn't money they have spent themselves. They haven't put any of their own money into the club at all. The investment in the stadium will be converted to a mortgage as well.
You want the club to run at a loss?
 
Doesn't sound right, if we only sold 25k at Wembley.or whl we don't pay them for the capacity.

That’s what I couldnt work out

As I understand it they get 45% of the gate receipts regardless where we played and it’s our call on wanting MK as our home ground for the game
 
Ok, I take your view on how fantastic it is at the club but I don't agree with it. I don't use our previous owners as a barometer because quite frankly our current owners have had 17 years at the helm which is virtually a generation and they are working in an era that is unprecedented in terms of cash. Whilst I can congratulate them on a job well done in many aspects and don't doubt they are trying to do a good job, I can also look at the wider picture and not just regurgitate the good stuff. There have been failings as well and its equally correct to point that out. And this window is a failing imo. People can use the smokescreen of a 10 yr viewpoint on whether a transfer was a success, that's nonsense too. Quite often, certainly in our history, we will have been through 2-3 managers in that time so this longer term look to describe something as a success is not compatible with the game today when looking at a transfer. On that basis, do we wait another 8 years before declaring whether Janssen is a success?

The owners have done a great job to get us to this point but over the last 5-6 years they have needed to stick their neck out a little which wouldn't have sent us full Leeds if it didn't work but they haven't done so because they won't invest anything outside of the what the club makes and that will not cut it anymore. Anything they invest over and above they are gonna recoup in spades not just when they sell but if we perform to our very best and win the league as example. What we needed was 2-3 signings of sufficient quality, it wasn't looking for a Emirates Marketing Project-esque spend up but the fact is that the squad is not good enough depth wise to cover for when 2-3 players in the 11 have an off day.

As for the three players you suggested, I wouldn't have described that as a good window for the reasons you have said, we are buying potential which is wonderful and De Ligt and Sessegnon especially, should be very good players in 2-3 years time but that isn't what we need. We have been shortcutting with potential and wasting money on the likes of N'koudou and N'jie so I would have looked on the window as a good one if we had bought a mix of experience and potential or just experience. So flipping it slightly, if we had sold Rose, Alderweireld and Dembele but bought in Martial, Kovacic/Rabiot and De Ligt for example then now I'm saying that's a good window aside from losing Toby because its got youth but experience certainly in the first two and undoubted quality in all three and actually, with the transfers out taken into account, would that have been an extravagant net spend? Maybe a net spend of about £65/£70m for a team who have finished in the top 3 the last 3 years? Is that really a lot to ask? Would that even be really pushing the boat out? The club have made more money this last couple of years than ever before from gate receipts, merit awards and TV money. I get the Alderweireld/Rose deals would likely have triggered movement so them not happening will have had an effect on business but hold up any other business?

I hear everything you say about the ins being linked to the outs but that's poor planning too. The club is overloaded with players that need to be moved on but haven't been. Who is in charge of the transfers out? The chairman. He can't be praised when its good but get no criticism when its bad and the planning has been bad. The world cup, the early window finish etc...….they didn't come out of nowhere, we knew they were happening. Its like when people moan about Christmas coming up, it happens the same time every year, its not like it popped up out of the blue and you were unprepared. We should have been looking at ways of getting rid well before the seasons end if it was going to prevent us buying. I am sure we will buy players once those go but we shouldn't just be replacing, we should be enhancing the quality level in the squad, not selling quality and trying to replace that directly because they won't stay, we should be adding to them.

I really don't see how we get anywhere if the name of the game is to not waste money so we can replace a world class talent with a potential world class talent...…..just buy the potential to play with the world class. And on the wasting money, I agree, don't buy another N'jie just for the sake of it because £10m is a lot of money to our club but to say to me that we couldn't afford one of the 4 players, as an example, that I mentioned? I would like to know why given how much money is flying around to be honest and to that end, I don't have any issue with that question being asked by the trust or anyone else but no one likes hard questions because they ruffle feathers.

I don't know and you don't know if that was asked slightly prior to the window closing......absolutely no way of knowing tbh but Ive questioned the transfer window despite all these 'positives' that made it a 'good window' and I don't see how its window that isn't questionable quite frankly and to me, it isn't a good window overall and the most telling part about it is that the chairman probably knows it isn't a good window because he decided against his usual page on the website at the windows end.

Anyway, your thoughts are backed up by your rational thinking and your perception of the situation and my thoughts are backed up by my perceptions. You think it was a good window and I don't...…...You don't like the trust asking questions of the board or the manner they did it etc and I don't mind that they did it at all......its really that simple.

fudge off and support someone else you moaning, self-loathing clown shoe.
 
He called him a gibbon. And a cheerleader. Neither gibbons nor cheerleaders are known for critical thinking, but they are cute, very agile, and tailless. None of those positive points apply to Gooners, so you've definitely lowered the debate.
See post #74, he’s not blameless.
 
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