Daniel Levy - Chairman

[DubaiSpur]

I believed Levy's previous transfer operations were because of circumstance and pragmatic thinking and with the club's long term goals at the heart of it. You obviously don't and clearly never did.

Wrong. I thought Levy tried his best, but was too cautious, too fearful, too desperate to be seen to be some sort of market genius to actually back his man at critical moments - 2011/2012 and so on. Plus, reputations aren't garnered for no reason, and around the same time that we fudged up the Moutinho deal at 11:59 pm on deadline day because it was too late to get the paperwork through was when I realized that Levy's deadline day shenanigans had been hurting us for a while.

Its strange how now the financial constraints and uncertainties are massively lower he's changing 'his habits' and reforming himself. He's doing nothing of the sort. He's just onto the next step of the plan, still backdropped by crunching the numbers.

Not quite. He's acted differently at different times, with only one real internal logic - desperation to wring the absolute maximum out of a deal, *even if it hurt squad preparation and readiness*. That has stayed the same from 2001 down to now, with a few notable (and noteworthy) exceptions - Modric foremost among them.

I've consistently mentioned that this hurts our managers, and isn't backing the coach in any way - it actually hurts them, since they have to make do with weaker squads, second-choices and bargain-bins when it doesn't work out. And I felt some of our coaches - particularly Poch, who remains the best coach we've had for fifty years - deserved a heck of a lot better from Levy, whom they trusted.

I've also mentioned that I don't really care if we end up with a negative or positive net spend, as long as we buy first, buy early and complete the squad early - selling afterwards to balance it if needed. I've been saying that for four years now, and it really isn't my fault if you consistently miss the point that terribly.

You've slated him no end up to now and if he now spends as you wish you'll gladly polish his bald little head.

Yes, that's called judging him based on what he does - unlike some on here and elsewhere, I have no need to 'polish his bald little head' 24/7 and praise him as some sort of Messiah come again who is the greatest thing to happen to football since they started volleying hedgehogs through the arches at Stonehenge.

If he spends early, gets business done quickly, backs his man with who he wants - that's good, and well done. If he doesn't - that's crap, and cuts his coaches a raw deal because of his own personal foibles.

That's actually the healthy way to look at things, unless of course you worship the ground he treads on and think he's literally faultless - which you, and some others here seem to do for reasons that are beyond me.

The sad thing is, he's been the same person all along.

If you truly believe that, I have several ENIC-approved bridges I'd like to sell you. People change. I'd like to see Levy change.

Thankfully, he might be.

 

[DubaiSpur]

Jeez.
1.He'd be on summer holidays for a lot of that.
2. His new squad would have fudged off on tour somewhere.
3. He would be in a medical room rebuilding his hamstring.

My main point was though, that you didn't know what you was talking about

And my main point was that you a) initially forgot we signed him on August 8, and b) think that saving 10 weeks' worth of wages on a 19 year old is worth delaying his signing by three months. I think that's being ludicrously penny wise and pound foolish.

You know we could have signed him well before his injury ,right? Like, right at the start of the window, end of the season, etc.? He was an 18-year old kid who desperately wanted to come here, playing for a Championship side. Why did we need to delay it at all?

That's the sort of thing that needs to change. It is changing, and that's my point - but it didn't start this summer, it started now, in January - signing Gedson early and then triggering Bergwijn's exit as quickly as he did.

That's good. That's commendable. If we'd gotten a striker, it would have been perfect - if we had moved out Wanyama and the deadwood along with Eriksen, even better. But as it stands, it's good.

My hats off to Levy, and I hope he goes in early on May 15th or whenever the season ends to get signings tied up for June 1st.

 

[Bishop]

Joker........the kid had a ripped hamstring and couldn't even run. Of course we should have got him in on June 1st and paid him 10 weeks wages to stare at the wall.

La Celso missed out on 14 days training because that's the earliest we should have got him in because of the Copa.

Been mentioned/covered a million times....and I'm the forgetful one

Not true. You know Lo Celso actually returned to Real Sociadad's training schedule while waiting for the deal to be completed? He could have joined us earlier, but he didn't. Now if you don't think that matters....cool I'll accept that we have differing opinions on the best way to harmonise a squad.

That is my issue and will always be an issue for me. Allow the player the most time to acclimatise, to become comfortable with what is planned for them, to allow the coach to actually get their hands on the players and run them through their paces. I can not see how bringing a player in earlier rather than later can be anything but a positive. [emoji848]

Levy is the chairman and a good one but we don't need to automatically defend every action he takes.

 

[parklane1]

Not true. You know Lo Celso actually returned to Real Sociadad's training schedule while waiting for the deal to be completed? He could have joined us earlier, but he didn't. Now if you don't think that matters....cool I'll accept that we have differing opinions on the best way to harmonise a squad.

That is my issue and will always be an issue for me. Allow the player the most time to acclimatise, to become comfortable with what is planned for them, to allow the coach to actually get their hands on the players and run them through their paces. I can not see how bringing a player in earlier rather than later can be anything but a positive. [emoji848]

Levy is the chairman and a good one but we don't need to automatically defend every action he takes.

I could not agree more and i have said that he is not perfect ( never met anyone in any job that is and i doubt that you have either)

But there is a poster on here who can not wait to get his vodoo doll out and sticking in the pins. He has always been the same and sad to say i guess he always will.

 

[Baleforce]

What happened? I suspect sacking the best manager he ever had had something to do with it. A man who begged for reinforcements that never came or came too late. Much as with Ramos and Redknapp, some spending was inevitable in January to rectify the crap situation the summer had left us with - much too late for Poch, of course.

As for the summer, he bought Sessegnon a couple of days before the window shut, too - or are you forgetting that? Out of three first team players in the summer, the only one in relatively early was NDombele - he f*cked around with Lo Celso and Sessegnon until almost deadline day, so forgive me for not being immediately convinced that this man had entirely turned a new leaf because of the stadium or the CL final.

Our financial situation may have changed, but I wanted to see if Levy himself had. Because I suspect that, whether we're worth 50m or 500m, his habits will be the defining factor in how we act - not our status. And his habit is to penny-pinch, shave pennies off a deal to the detriment of squad readiness and preparation.

That might be changing now, and I'll be happy if it is.



Mmhmm. I think eradicating pre-season time is a consequence of the lateness of our deals, not a goal of his. But I think he severely undervalues how much that costs us relative to the couple of percent he can shave off the fee.



Or, alternately, we can't move players in and out quickly enough, and accumulate stale squads relative to our competitors.

I actually don't think we actually get a better ROI than any of Dortmund, Leverkusen, Atletico or Sevilla, our roughly comparable cousins in other leagues in terms of ambitions, stature and relative (not absolute) financing. Although I admit it's fairly difficult to quantify.

Players going stale is a failure of coaching and personal development more than recruitment in my opinion.

I quantify it by them needing to spend more than us (relative to league peers) for the same return.

 

[ricky2tricky4city]

Not true. You know Lo Celso actually returned to Real Sociadad's training schedule while waiting for the deal to be completed? He could have joined us earlier, but he didn't. Now if you don't think that matters....cool I'll accept that we have differing opinions on the best way to harmonise a squad.

That is my issue and will always be an issue for me. Allow the player the most time to acclimatise, to become comfortable with what is planned for them, to allow the coach to actually get their hands on the players and run them through their paces. I can not see how bringing a player in earlier rather than later can be anything but a positive. [emoji848]

Levy is the chairman and a good one but we don't need to automatically defend every action he takes.

I said he should have joined us earlier?

 

[Bishop]

I said he should have joined us earlier?

I mean why not? Why have him join later? I can't see how that was of benefit to us?

 

[ricky2tricky4city]

I mean why not? Why have him join later? I can't see how that was of benefit to us?

If you read the thread back you'll see that the conversation was about Dubai saying Levy was still up to his usual tricks last summer and only got Ndombele in in 'reasonable' time when there were clearly reasons (that either Dubai didn't know about or didn't disclose for effect?) why the other two couldn't or little point joining on June 1st.

That's just foul play when bashing someone, and if left unchecked spreads untruths.

Even if we'd signed La Celso on June 1st, a fair assumption would be he'd of walked in something like July 20th with time off given after the Copa. Plus weve ended up paying £42m for him when the price always mooted was £55/56m. Whether the delay helped get us that structure is speculation but definitely feasible.(of course, irrelevant if saving money is not your thing). As for the Sess deal, almost irrelevant to the point being made due to the circumstances.

I've played football for many teams and being there at the start of pre season is 100% the best option and even moreso at prem level as managers and club will have their own culture,systems and philosophys, plus pre season is a much more relaxed time to get to know your new team mates. To not think that is not even an option. But as I think @Bedfordspurs alluded too, player purchases at this level are also more complicated. Money can smooth out a lot of those complications, but we were a club watching the pennies, we've probably more clout now (along with an attractive set-up) BUT it will still be % of revenue etc. Think we're 8th in Europe on that front so it's not surprising we start to operate in a different way . It won't be Levy changing, it's the landscape that's has changed.

 

[nayenezgani]

One weekend without a game and GG descends into this nonsense again...

 

[Lemonade Money]

One weekend without a game and the usual idiots descend into this nonsense again...

 

[scaramanga]

Wrong. I thought Levy tried his best, but was too cautious, too fearful, too desperate to be seen to be some sort of market genius to actually back his man at critical moments - 2011/2012 and so on. Plus, reputations aren't garnered for no reason, and around the same time that we fudged up the Moutinho deal at 11:59 pm on deadline day because it was too late to get the paperwork through was when I realized that Levy's deadline day shenanigans had been hurting us for a while.

We didn't fudge up that deal. Moutinho's agent had part ownership and insisted on an exorbitant price at the last minute.

 

[Finney Is Back]

how much is that us underpaying or them overpaying?

Seeing as all the other top 6 spend significantly more than us and Everton (not a top 4 team) pay about the same as us I think that probably indicates it's the former.

 

[Finney Is Back]

Most of it is just the difference in overall turnoverbudget.

Us keeping our wage budget under control has been vital in our success imo. I have no problems with it being labeled as us underpaying, and compared to what some of our players could potentially get at other clubs some probably are underpaid.

We've managed to only lose Walker (for a ton of money) and Eriksen (for a limited fee) that we would have liked to keep if they were happy. We're obviously doing a lot right.

I partly agree with you. However our wage bill was kept at about 40% of turnover, which I believe was the most frugal in the whole league. I believe that around 55% is considered to a 'sensible' level. Maybe adding that 15% extra to the wage bill would've allowed us to get Mane instead of N'Jie and Wjinbaldum instead of Sissoko for example?

I get that we can't compete with the clubs with the biggest turnovers as we don't have the turnover to support that. However only spending 40% of turnover on player wages does mean that we are underpaying compared to the whole league.

 

[Finney Is Back]

He didn't hang about in the summer bar LaCelso and that's debatable?

So two windows he's 'reformed' himself and dropped his 'habits' ....... you're such a joker.

What d'you suppose has happened to accommodate Levy having such a sea change of approach these last two windows.

Gone to financial counseling?

Didn't we sign two of our three new first team squad players on deadline day itself?

 

[Finney Is Back]

Joker........the kid had a ripped hamstring and couldn't even run. Of course we should have got him in on June 1st and paid him 10 weeks wages to stare at the wall.

La Celso missed out on 14 days training because that's the earliest we should have got him in because of the Copa.

Been mentioned/covered a million times....and I'm the forgetful one

Actually it wasn't the earliest that we could've got Lo Celso in.

 

[ricky2tricky4city]

Didn't we sign two of our three new first team squad players on deadline day itself?

I refer the honourable gentleman to the answer I gave some moments ago.

 

[ricky2tricky4city]

Actually it wasn't the earliest that we could've got Lo Celso in.

I refer the honourable gentleman to the clarification post I gave some moments after

 

[Finney Is Back]

We didn't fudge up that deal. Moutinho's agent had part ownership and insisted on an exorbitant price at the last minute.

While I mostly agree with you here, some of the problem was that we were susceptible to that last minute hike because we waited for so long to agree the deal in the first place. There was then no time to renegotiate because the first offer close to being acceptable was only made right at the end of the window.

 

[ricky2tricky4city]

I partly agree with you. However our wage bill was kept at about 40% of turnover, which I believe was the most frugal in the whole league. I believe that around 55% is considered to a 'sensible' level. Maybe adding that 15% extra to the wage bill would've allowed us to get Mane instead of N'Jie and Wjinbaldum instead of Sissoko for example?

It certainly was frugal.........can't think why?

Oh yep.....he's a tight c.unt.

 

[Baleforce]

Seeing as all the other top 6 spend significantly more than us and Everton (not a top 4 team) pay about the same as us I think that probably indicates it's the former.

Yet we’ve been taking one of the top four berths so all of those 6 can’t have been getting value for that money.