Posted on Friday, 11th May 2012 by Jay
Another one we 'almost' signed
Unless there’s a massive turnaround, or all the reports are rubbish, then Paul Pogba is set to join the land where black footballers are welcomed with open arms in the Summer.
Pogba’s departure to the Old Lady is the least of United’s worries as it’s not keeping our players that represents Sir Alex’s biggest problem: it’s buying the ones we really want and more importantly desperately need. As Manchester City acquire practically every target they set their cash covered hearts on, we’re left scrounging around for left overs or buying up youngsters who’ve yet to hit puberty in a bid to ‘get there before we can’t afford them.’ It’s as though United have stopped shopping at Waitrose and started raiding the farms and car boot sales for players no one else has yet spotted or made a firm bid for.
Take a look at United’s pursuit of Eden Hazard, as soon as Sir Alex mentions he’s looking at the Lille youngster, City show an interest and look like buying the talented playmaker. This is a worrying trait that’s simply got to stop if United aren’t going to get left behind. It’s not just City who’ve beaten us to players in the past and threaten to do so once more, Shinji Kagawa- a player seemingly destined for Old Trafford only a few days ago could now end up at the Emirates as it’s reported Arsenal are chasing the Borussia Dortmund youngster.
Looking over the past few seasons its painfully obvious just how many of United’s targets have chosen other clubs much to the detriment of our first team. The list of players is pretty startling when you consider what many of them have gone on to achieve. Gareth Bale was coveted by both United and Spurs yet chose White Hart Lane over Old Trafford, despite Ryan Giggs being deployed to convince him to join us. Aaron Ramsey chose Arsenal over United for reasons almost certainly not based on silverware. Then there’s the players we’ve lost to our ‘noisy neighbours’ Yaya Toure, David Silva and Samir Nasri have all preferred the blue side of Manchester- no doubt due to our reluctance to meet their wage demands, while we decided not to give Carlos Tevez the money he was offered at Eastlands, be honest, was that such a savvy money saving move?
Had United bought just one of the players I’ve mentioned then surely we’d be a point above City and heading for title number 20, maybe we’d even be heading to Munich for a Champions League final such is the fine line one player can often make. Okay the Champions League final may be pushing it, but surely an Aaron Ramsey or a Gareth Bale is worth a point, or United signing Silva and not City could actually have still left the “35 years” banner up at Old Trafford -now on 37?
United need to start being more aggressive in our pursuit of players, this isn’t a new development, not so many years ago we let Arjen Robben move to Chelsea when he was seemingly destined for United, as he helped Jose Mourinho bring about the greatest time in the club’s history.
“The Glazers, The Glazers” I hear you cry, as every United fans favourite bogeymen are brought up whenever it comes to transfer discussions. I know the American owners have been about as good for United as Ralph Milne but let me ask you, did the Glazers really prevent us from spending £5 million on Aaron Ramsey? Not the same owners who sanctioned more than that for either Bebe- he’ll come good one day, or Gabriel Obertan- destined for great things.
Sir Alex Ferguson has admitted being ‘hesitant’ over signing Tevez on a longer deal, while the United boss was apparently put off by the figures being quoted for Silva’s transfer.
I’m not saying United should break the bank for any youngster that comes along, but surely now is the time, to mark out our targets and aggressively pursue them, in the long-term it may prove a lot less expensive than missing out on what could be vital players.
Let’s face some hard facts playing for United is no longer the carrot it used to be to some players, particularly youngsters from the continent, it’s time to start showing them why they’d be better off at Old Trafford, rather than just hoping they’ll want to come here.
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Tags: Sir Alex Ferguson
Posted in Blogs, We'll never die | Comments (23)
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May 11th, 2012 at 2:15 am
I’ll say this again: we should’ve never let carlos tevez go. we chose a guy with good pr over a goal-scoring machine.
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PAUL Reply:
June 27th, 2012 at 7:38 pm
mate that guy you are talkin about as done just as much as tevez has at utd and for the record talent is not anyting with out respect
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May 11th, 2012 at 2:37 am
Liked the honesty there Red Flag. African players dont like Fergie. The comment about Tevez ‘looking busy’ got over analysed here.They also seem to feel that the twins are about to get abused. Would this put off Argentinians and Brazilians? They think that playing for MANU is playing for Fergie. Can we challenge in Europe with just European players? especially the noise?
Yearning for the days when I was just bitter.
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May 11th, 2012 at 4:42 am
That was going alright until the Tevez bit. Even his first year was only just about decent and his second not much atall – and we really need somebody with his attitude like a hole in the head. Some people really need to think a bit before posting.
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May 11th, 2012 at 6:14 am
his continued preference in scholes ,giggs, evra has lead to this debacle….we had a managers dream player coming through the ranks before also…anyone remember magnus eikrem…..we let him go also though he didnt want to go….now that pogba is leaving, it only a matter of time when other young players start questioning the managers word to promise them first team football in the future…then we’ll have even more youngsters leaving….we’r tagging pertucci, daelhi brady for greatness but we have to see that until we dont get rib of the 32 yr old carrick and 37 yr old scholes and 39 yr old giggs….nothings gonna change….they’ll sign an extension, youngsters will get frustrated and then just like pogba they run off to some other club…
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May 11th, 2012 at 7:04 am
rubbish journalism
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May 11th, 2012 at 7:19 am
Nice piece of article but you forget to mention mesut oezil who was offer to fergie for just £8 million,but he blantly refuse to sign him.fergie hate africans and muslims even if he’ll not admit it.for God sake we are in 2o12,but he keeps playing the pattern of the eighties and also he sign mostly expensive overrated british players.personnally I think phil jones was too expensive at £16million,we don’t need to break the bank before we improve the squad,we should take a queue from newcastle united,they got demba ba,hatem ben arfa,papiss demba cisse,cheik tiote and yohann kabaye all for less than £20million.what are our scout doing for God sake?.they are very good decent players out there that will really improve our team for a decent fee as well,fergie should please stop wasting money on english players let us develope all the english players we need from our accademy.let him go for kagawa,fallaini(who will be our own version of yaya toure)younis belhanda(who in my opinion is better than hazard and a more cheaper option),emmanuel angyaman badu(the ghanian and udinese midfield spoiler)and a fourth striker like seydou doumbia from cska moskva or obafemi martins(a more cheaper option and a very good finisher if the right supply was provided to occupy the fourth striker’s role pending when william kean will be finally ready to step up)get leigton baines(even thought he’s english and will contradict my earlier statement about english players I do consider him a bargain at £10million and a solution to the left back position which evra have been poor this season) and lastly he should break the bank if he can and sign us iker muniain to finally replace ronaldo.I think the kid is a mixture of both ronaldo and messi,fergie can mould him into a world beater.carrick should please go I think he’s the one that is deceiving fergie making him believe we have good midfielders.giggs too should retire have’nt he had enough?anyway our midfield for next season should look like this,cleverly,falaini,badu,kagawa,anderson,fetcher,belhander and muniain(the last two can also play as wingers too depending on the formation).having captain vida back next season and baines at left back should bring normalcy at the back.fabio(can go out on loan),carrick,berbatov,park,(scholes should be allow to retire peacefully and also giggs too).the experence of rio,vida,evra and wayne should be enough to see us through.
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May 11th, 2012 at 8:04 am
This has been the case for years, City are serial offenders of gazumping of Utd targets. Silva was an odd one because Utd had a fee in place with Valencia from the febuary before he went blue. This was also the case with David Villa although he simply wanted to stay in Spain.
The biggest issue I have is at times SAF Appears to be blinded by nostalgia and almost shruggs his shoulders when we lose out in the transfer market, then there’s the “it’s ok we will have another class of 92 along in a minute”. As Ravel Morrison, Pogba and potentially Fryers will prove that gold mine is not baring riches.
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May 11th, 2012 at 12:19 pm
to keep up with the tough competition in world football we aggresively need to replace our ageing and average players with some worldclass players. some have been loyal but loyalty will not bring us trophies. united have broken alot of sweat to win matches this season and unfortunately have nothing much to show. the scouting job has been done, certified and proven performers have been identified, BUY THEM. you dont run a 10,000m race and with only a few metres left you backout to do a simpler 5,000m one….thats what united is doing
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May 11th, 2012 at 2:39 pm
Let’s be honest, City pimped us on Nasri and Silve because they had more money. How can you blame Nasri who was offered $170 euros a week! We will make Hazard and Sneijder a generous offer, a mind blowing offer, only to have City offer $20K more a week. If you’re a 21 year old footballer and you’re being offered $170-$200K a week to play for a team that just won the title? It’s not that hard to turn down United. We should select 1 player who can give us the edge again next season and offer them the bank otherwise, we will have to play with old and young players.
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May 11th, 2012 at 3:27 pm
i agree with all the above statememnts, everyone is making true and valid point on united from this season and the last 4/5 years. Its time for change, but it wont come until fergie leaves united. YES THATS RIGHT, fergie needs to leave united now.
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May 11th, 2012 at 4:38 pm
Berbatov 10?
Owen free
Young 15
Macheta 5
Anderson because of injures 10
Park 5
All out for around 40m ish
Hazard 33
Martinace 30ish
Kagawa 7
Villa 15
All in for around 85m
And let scholls and giggs retire while they still have they dignity
And with all the ins and outs the wages should roughly stay the same
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May 11th, 2012 at 5:06 pm
We can’t say the money isn’t there, having spent 60 mill last summer, not to mention what we’ve spent at Bebe, Anderson, Hargreaves. The money has been ill used, Sir Alex seems over reliant on old players and both his scouts and straff seems incompetent. So maybe, as bad as it sounds, the first change to be made is changing the manager?
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May 11th, 2012 at 6:08 pm
We find a talented youngster, we turn him in to a superstar and then we sell him to real madrid. THIS HAS TO STOP.
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May 11th, 2012 at 7:42 pm
Apart from we have less funds available to spend than City (Because the Glazer’s family is a bad owner for United), we also have the problem of corruption in the transfer market.
Look at the signing of Tosic, Bebe, Anderson, etc. These are very poor signing which should never happened. We signed so many over-rated players during the last 3-4 seasons. Players like Ashley Young is a second grade player while City keep on signing top class players. That’s why currently City have a better quality team than United.
Currently, the Police of Portugese is investigating the signing of Bebe case, as they believe that there are something wrong behind the scene. If United really pay 7 million pounds plus for Bebe’s signature, where does the money gone? As ex-Bebe’s club recieved only 3 million pounds plus.
United scouts in the transfer market, lead by Martin Ferguson (SAF’s brother) like to convince SAF to sign second grade players who don’t have any offer from other big clubs. So they can UP their price and make room for some corruptions. That’s why the Portugese Police is confident that there is something wrong in Bebe’s transfer.
Of course, we will improve in the summer by signing new players. But if we keep on signing second grade players while City keep on bringing in Top Class players like Eden Hazard, next season the gap will be bigger and bigger.
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May 11th, 2012 at 10:39 pm
IMO ,saf has a conections with football agents to make their clients more expensive in the market,seeing all the best players that fly there trade in european clubs has been links to United,before joining another team,and how can you rely on a 39 yrs old to run riot in the most competative league on the planet. Saf most change his policy before is too late.
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May 11th, 2012 at 11:01 pm
Ferguson had learnt his lesson.Am only beging him 2 sign iker muniain at all cost.And utd did nt av any defending midfielder.If we av pls let us knw who he is?Dat is y we can competite wit city who av toure.
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May 11th, 2012 at 11:23 pm
You have hit it on the head. Problem is fergie does not seem to want to shop big anymore. His tactics are useless. He needs a good right hand man badly as phelan is worse than useless. We are told there is no value in the market??!! Silva was 20 million, toure was a bit more and even aguero didn’t cost a lot more than Berbatov! Problem is fergie is past his best and his methods and tactics are old fashioned and not flexible. Need change for sure.
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May 12th, 2012 at 7:09 pm
We need to face the cold hard facts here, City will always outspend us, we dont have the financial means to exclusively attract the best players any more. If we offer Sneijder 250k a week, City will offer him 500k a week. They’ll do that quite comfortably. And who are we to blame Sneijder for taking 500k over 250k??? If u were offered a job in Tesco for 250k and the same job in Netto for 500k id bet my house none of u would give two s***s about the prestige of the supermarket ud just go for which place is paying you the most ie ud work for nettos. Prestige means nothing anymore.
Its a losing battle all the above mentioned chased the money, we didnt have a chance with Nasri when City were involved. We also shouldnt give up hope with the academy, we’ve got some real gems. If u look at the talent coming through the academy itl make ur mouth water, the like of Larnell Cole, Tunicliffe and Matty James look to be the real deal. I think these guys really will give our midfield a real revamp. A good thing about the rise of City tho is that all the glory supporting foreign fans who are destroying the once great Old Trafford atmosphere will bugger off to the wastelands and we’ll slowly have the atmosphere we used to be famous for again!!!!
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May 12th, 2012 at 9:20 pm
I still don’t think my venerable friends on the red side get it. Here goes. You are three quarters of a billion pounds in debt. Your manager is in his seventies. Your culture allows you to erect banners gloat g and now players simply don’t fancy playing for you. I say, re erect your banner and over the next ten years the true joke will start to emerge. Otherwise good luck tomorrow against Sunderland. You will beat them and stiil stand a chance. Keep calm and carry on
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Arbiter Reply:
May 15th, 2012 at 9:46 am
The debt is now closer to a quarter of a billion pounds, not thrice that amount, so get that particular fact right. By the way, if we were to note the losses your club has made in the last four seasons, it would easily top half-a-billion in losses, if not for your sugar daddy.
Our manager is old, might be getting on with age, and might even be a bit senile, but he and his team hunted your collection of mercenaries to within a few seconds of the title. 44 years to win a title, 35 years to win a trophy, and 3 stars on the crest for God-knows-what, considering you’ve spent two seasons in total in Europe in the group stages.
Get back here once your team is closer to league titles in double-digits and has a balance sheet which is not dripping in red.
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May 13th, 2012 at 11:20 pm
The problem is SAF. He simply does not see what others see clearly: we do not have a competitive midfield. Or he does see it but does not come clean with fans
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May 14th, 2012 at 9:47 pm
You are right about our midfield but that has needed addressing for the last three years. The problem now is that we have shortcomings in other areas of the team. Its all catching up. Fergie said last year he would strenghtened to compete with Barcelona. Look however how second rate european teams showed us up. Frankly its time for real change in vision and direction. City is not united’s problem.
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