There was an interesting interview with Chairman Peter Hill-Wood on the official site yesterday. Most of it was run of the mill stuff, about how the board are patient but not complacent, and it ties in with what Danny Fiszman said a few days previously – that it’s time to bring some silverware to the new stadium.
The bit that caught my eye though was when he was asked about transfers and he replied:
There is an awful lot of talk about big transfers and major demands of players but you will find throughout the UK and Europe that money is not quite as easy to obtain as it used to be. So I think a lot of these stories emanating from agents may not actually come to fruition. There is a lot of talk and not a lot of action.
And how true that is. Let’s remember that the vast majority of what you read in the newspapers is put there by agents trying to drum up business for their client. And this summer we’ve seen agents look like proper chumps. The best example, I suppose, is that of Arshavin’s agent who said a £19m bid had been received from a Premier League club. This turned out to be pure fiction and the agent is now desperately trying to get clubs interested at a much lower price. Players, clubs and agents are going to have to realise that the prices/wages they’re looking for are simply unrealistic.
Another example of how the market has fallen is the transfer of Ronaldinho to AC Milan. He’s gone for €21m according to the Spanish press this morning. This time last year there was talk of the Italians spending €60m+ on him and while I accept part of the lower transfer fee is because the player’s star has faded somewhat a lot of it has to do with the way the market is.
It has been fueled by pure greed for the last few years, the massive influx television money, Bosman transfers etc have all played their part. I think someone like Mathieu Flamini can count himself very lucky – he managed to do his deal before people started thinking ‘Hey, it might be a good idea to be somewhat sensible about money’.
Adebayor is probably unlucky in that his outrageous demands for more money have dragged on so long that they’re now even more ludicrous than when he and his agents first made them. But then that’s just tough shit for him. I haven’t got the slightest bit of sympathy for him.
The transfer market across Europe has been deadly quiet this summer. I can’t remember a close season like it, to be honest. There have been no big huge deals, no megastars being moved. Barcelona have had a difficult time selling Ronaldinho and even 6 months ago if they’d said ‘€21m for Ronnie’ there’d have been a queue of clubs around the block waiting to bite their hands off.
Liverpool haven’t signed anyone of note, United either, Chelsea have bought Deco but they’re a special case in that economic difficulties don’t really make any difference to them. By comparison we’ve spent relatively big so far. £5m for Aaron Ramsey and somewhere in the region of £11m for Samir Nasri. Now, I’m not trying to say all our problems are solved with those two, there’s clearly work to be done, but our transfer market activity has to be viewed as part of the bigger picture, not just on its own.
Now, Ronaldinho to Milan is interesting as it almost certainly rules out any chance of Adebayor going there. That leaves only Barcelona as a possible and still much depends on their ability to move on Samuel Eto’o. Reports in the Catalan press this morning say Hleb will arrive in Spain today to finalise his move so Hleb is more of a priority than Adebayor. There are suggestions than Valencia might buy Eto’o but they are pretty fucked financially so any deal there is likely to involve a player swap, possibly involving David Silva.
So Adebayor may find himself in the very uncomfortable position of having agitated all summer for a move away from Arsenal but with nobody out there to buy him. Interestingly El Mundo run a story saying Barcelona want to sign a ‘mega crack’ (superstar) with the money raised by the sales of Ronaldinho and Eto’o but Adebayor’s name is not mentioned at all. Another article says that Barcelona fans would prefer to keep Eto’o than spend money on Adebayor. Ooooops. Egg on face, tail between legs, and Mr Unpopular with the fans. That’s a good summer’s work for a player who should have just kept his fucking mouth shut and thought about his career rather than his retirement.
So, we’ll see what happens in the transfer market. Maybe it’s beginning to kick off a bit. It does look as if Hleb will sign for Barcelona today so that gives us some more money to play with – how we spend it remains to be seen, but there’s plenty of time left to do that. But let’s not lose sight of the market we’re operating in which, ultimately, may suit us as players will go for lower prices and with more reasonable wages.
In other news it does look as if Gilberto is definitely on his way to Greece. If he leaves then I can’t see us fail to make a central midfield signing, unless the boss decides someone like Diaby deserves his chance in there. There’s talk about Barry and Xabi Alonso from Liverpool, either of whom would add experience and quality to the team, in my opinion. It’s an interesting situation as well – Benitez has been counting on the money from the sale of Alonso to fund the purchase of Barry so we could try and gazump them on Barry or take advantage of the fact they need cash to sign Alonso. Naturally we’ll just sign that Bischoff bloke for free instead but a man can dream, can’t he?
Real Sociedad want to take youngsters Fran Merida and Pedro Botelho on loan next season.
And that’s really about that. Until tomorrow but will update if I spot anything regarding Hleb’s move to Spain.
Update: Hleb’s Barcelona medical is scheduled for 7pm this evening and he should be presented as a Barcelona player tomorrow. Barcelona have more or less confirmed the deal on their official site (link in Spanish).
