swipe right wrote:Power n Glory wrote:swipe right wrote:I will say it again, winter is not the time to be buying top talent. It is very rare that good players move in this window. It is only contract hold outs. Perhaps the club is exploring such options. We don’t know yet. Or maybe they are looking at loan deals like Wijnaldum. Which would be a decent stop gap solution.
The point I don’t get is with regards to Auba. We are certainly not going to get a top center forward in January. We rejected the chance to give Laca and Nketiah long term deals. So why did we alienate our one senior striker with a long term deal? Is it more important to make a point to the squad about tardiness or is it more important to have options till the end of the season? If Arteta had enough of Auba could he not have waited till the summer to boot him out?
We can make up for it if we sign Vlahovic. He was a summer target and it may be best for us to try and convince players to move in January instead of summer. Way more competition for signings during the summer and we'd be at a disadvantage if we don’t make Top 4.
So how do you convince him to move right now when he can move in summer to clubs that have secured CL? And how do you convince Fiorentina to sell mid season when they could get the same amount or more for him in summer?
The only two quality strikers that I remember moving in winter were Adebayor to us and Suarez to Liverpool. I literally cannot think of another of the top of my head.
Aubameyang as well.
If the reports are true about the club wanting a large fee up front, the player wanting the move but it's the agent holding it up because he wants a large fee as well, we have the answer. We'll have to pay up.
Because money is tight for most clubs during the pandemic, there are no guarantees they will be able to get this sort of money elsewhere. I think they're willing to play ball if the money is right. Biggest sticking point is the player and if he's willing to move in the winter, then it's just on us to pay up along with the fee to the agent if we want him bad enough.
Gone are the days where our rep would have players pushing to move to us and willing to compromise to make a deal happen. I don't fancy our chances in the summer when swimming with the big fish. Fiorentina could hold out for the summer for the bigger clubs but as said, the bigger clubs may not want to pay as much and can always unsettle the player to try and force a move.