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I’m already looking forward to another summer scouring my Twitter feed in search of that needle in a haystack – a credible transfer rumour. The media will be busy making things up: ‘Spurs in deal to sell Soldado to Real Madrid for £40m plus Bale’; ‘Adebayor to Barcelona, but only if he’s guaranteed starting striker spot’; ‘Lennon, Townsend, Lamela, Chirices, Dembele, Capoue in swap deal for Ings’ (I live in hope). Not forgetting our old mate Damiao.
We’re all desperate to see the club pull off a stunning deal or two following yet another aimless whimper of a season. But since the heady days of 2013 when we lashed out £100m on – well let’s be honest - some right old rubbish, courtesy of Baldini’s unfailing eye for a player, we’ve hardly featured at the high stakes end of the market. Vorm, Fazio, Dier – not exactly earth-shattering (albeit Dier will prove to be a shrewd buy).
And, this summer, we know exactly what to expect. My guess is that the club has been briefing the press to lower our expectations. Read the one about Harry and Ryan being so good, we don’t need to buy anyone? Well, yes, they have indeed been wonderful, and we know that Alli along with Pritchard and Carroll, will add to our pool of exciting talent; I’d hazard that youngsters like Winks, Walker-Peters, Carter-Vickers and Onomah will also get some game time. Now, of course, Man United’s kids did ok back in the 90s, but they were the exception that proved the rule. It’s crystal clear that the club expects us to be satisfied with another transitional season (our 37th in the last 42 years) while taking pride in the excellence of our youth system.
But pride, if I may state the bleedin’ obvious, doesn’t win you anything whereas ambition might. I love watching a brilliant kid flower – I was there when a gangly be-mulleted genius called Hoddle was amazing us with his teenage bravado – but half-decent runs in the Capital One and FA Cups are the best we can hope for next season.
Lest there was any doubt about the club’s current philosophy, we were fed an extraordinary board minute about reverting to the policy of buying and developing younger players in the £10-15m range. This sounds like an admission that splashing out on players with big reputations was the wrong policy. But that’s counter-intuitive. Not many of Real Madrid’s expensive stars fail. Nor do Barcelona’s or Chelsea’s or Man City’s (until this season, anyway). Spending big per se isn’t the problem - buying the wrong players is.
At least we should see the back of some of the deadwood (although we’ve heard that before). The inadequate Capoue, Chirices and Kaboul, the laughably talentless Paulinho, poor old Sod… ado (sic) and the gifted but ineffective Dembele. I’d happily dispense with the most prolific possession-conceder in modern football, Lamela, too, along with the able but ‘don’t mess up my hair’ Chadli, although I expect Adebayor to continue lounging in first class for one more year.
That’s a fairly drossy list, I’ll grant you, but they could, cumulatively, raise a small fortune. Think how many promising kids that’ll buy. Clubs in the third and fourth tiers will be licking their lips at the prospect of all those fresh-faced Spurs loanees. Or, of course, we’ll actually buy no-one and the club will simply boost the coffers ahead of the new stadium, to wit, Harry is going to be worth Bale money before the roof is built. Know what I mean? A cynic might suggest that the jaw-dropping cost of that project is what’s really driving the club’s current transfer policy.
Cynic? Moi?
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you've not thought it through enough when you make the case about spending big. You can't compare Barca, City etc to us. When we buy big we are still buying players yet to become world stars, therefore, still a risk. Players like Lamela (1 good year in Italy) and Paulinho (good in Brazil) are big money but not guarantees of success. When Barca buy Suarez and Madrid buy Bale, they have already succeeded in a big league. But, again to against your theory, over the years these teams have still failed a few times... the difference is, they can afford to fail, because if that £30m player doesn't work out, 2 of the others might. Basically, when you're buying from the second tier it is a risk, no matter how much you soend and that is the world we are in, this is not the fault of Tottenham, it's life.
ReplyDeleteI take your point about us not being comparable to Barca etc, but that doesn't we shouldn't try to compete at the highest level. But we have to buy the right players. Paulinho was a regular in the Brazil national team, Lamela was hailed as the new Messi (and had a stellar season in 2012/13) and Soldado had a 1/2 goalscoring record in the best league in the world and at international level. Granted that lot aren't in Bale's class, but they were undeniably elite players who'd all succeeded at the highest level. However, they were the wrong players and my feeling is that the club splashed the Bale cash recklessly without properly vetting the incomers. £26m for a 28 year old? Hmm. Baldini has a lot to answer for. Now they're reverting to type as though the fact of spending big was the problem as opposed to the selection policy.
ReplyDeleteI agree that nobody guarantees success. Even Bale is struggling (trust me, I saw him at the Bernabeu a few weeks ago and he was pathetic). But going into our shells having wasted big money is not the answer and smacks of a lack of ambition. Maybe we can't compete for the megastars, but we have the financial clout to vet and buy better players than most. And we can also afford the odd failure (I count six of them from the 2013 intake) and still do ok. 7th and a cup final isn't to be sniffed at. The club is wealthy, well managed and will always be a top half team however many Lamelas fail. My concern is that we seem to have settled for 'ok'.
Simon Lipson