Spurs doesn't say no to Madrid per se, they just want more money. Modric will go regardless, he wants a higher income and Spurs have a wage cap. Anita really wants out, he feels he doesn't get the recognition he deserves while playing for Ajax considering van Rhijn is the only Dutch international we have right now. He probably ponders that he has more chance of making the squad if he succeeds in England and I think he's right. The only reason why I think the deal may fall through is because NUFC apparently wants him as their RB and Anita obviously prefers DM.
If Vurnon goes to Newcastle and plays RB after finally establishing himself in his preferred position at Ajax...
Jong Ajax currently 2 - 1 behind in Alkmaar. Boymans and Berghuis have scored for AZ while Gino van Kessel has scored a goal after few minutes of coming on for Ajax. Boerrigter played for 60 minutes, but hasn't shown much and was together with Koppers one of the lesser souls on the pitch. Gravenberch who came in for him has done a lot more offensively including a shot on the post. Boccara once again impressive.
Anita is a fool if he thinks that he'll get more recognition playing RB for a mid table PL team than he would playing DM for Ajax in the CL. He's a crap RB in the first place, so in all likelihood he'll play his way to the bench and not even get a chance at playing DM. Besides that there's a reason why he never got recognition while here: It's because he spent most of the time playing fullback and he wasn't good enough on that position to get called up to the NT. The fact that he constantly misses the Oranje selection is a crime but it has nothing to do with him playing for Ajax
Please Please Please Please Please!!! Then hopefully Boccara will be able to step into that slot next season full time and maybe even play a few minutes there this season. IMO Barca players way down the pecking order are ideal for us (in positions where we are lacking) and we are ideal for them. We get players who can slot right in because they've already been trained in our style and are good quality - just not yet ready to get good minutes in the best team in the world. They get to prove themselves in the CL and don't have to adjust much. (yes I had a slight change in opinion)
There's some things wrong with the Catanaccio article but it's really neither here nor there. The big damage to the club was done by Jaake and van den Boog and Coronel came in to clean it up. There did a lot of good in that regard and IMO were treated poorly by a lot of people (including Cruijff who really doesn't understand a balance sheet). One can look at the money wasted on transfers and resultant salary and that makes up a significant portion of what is wrong. The article does not that the transfer fees are amortized over the life of the contract (the €16M for Sulejmani are not booked in one year but spread out over the 5 year contract). Most of these players have been rubbish in terms of their ultimate impact for the club. Some of them were decent such as Bulykin who came in for one year relatively cheaply. I think this experience has soured the senior financial management of the club in terms of over paying for players. The bigger problem has been not having a director of football operations who has the business sense to make sure the the young players have appropriate contracts so that the club can maximize their value when they are sold. We keep getting caught with the player have one more year to go and rather than seeing them leave on a Bosman, we have to sell at a discount. The two exceptions to this were Huntelaar and Suarez (but strikers always get a premium). I do think that the current football management of FdB, Jonk, Bergkamp, and Overmars are the right ones for the club and will move things forward. Overmars also has business experience which will be quite helpful. Anyway, thanks for the link; I hadn't seen this one.
It's early days for Sana of course, but a performance like that for a guy who's trained for about a week with the team I thought was very encouraging. Surely he'll improve? I don't see the need to spend big on Assaidi: Boerrigter (that's a hard name to spell without looking it up!) will get at least some games, Fischer may break through in the course of this season and Sana, off yesterday's showing, can't possibly turn out worse than the likes of Ebecilio. It's for defensive cover the money should be spent (now that Anita apparently is leaving) IMO.
It's probably not my place to comment so I apologise in advance, but I think the problem with Ajax is that there are far too many management structures and as a result factions fighting each other, and a director of football would only add another dimension to an already complicated infrastructure. You can't really run a club democratically. This isn't politics.
Doesn't look like Assaidi is coming at the moment. Ajax have offered 1,1m as a salary, but he wants a lot more. Perhaps we should go for someone like Wildschut instead and save some of that money for a midfielder and/or defender.
You are correct about this being the fundamental problem with the club. There's something to be said about how well Musterman has run Twente given where they were not all that long ago. When you look at the Ajax organization chart, one wonders how they even get anything accomplished.
I don't think Bayern have as convoluted a structure as Ajax and they also have people on the commercial side who know how to brand the team. In the studies I've seen on football finance, Bayern are the most successful team in Europe at generating money from the commercial side (this excludes television money which they don't get as much since Germany likes to keep fees low in this regard). There was a typo error in my earlier post. It should have "...article does note that transfer fees..." You are right that the salary line is absolutely crazy. I wonder if it also includes youth coaches and support staff in addition to players? That's the only way it makes sense to me.
Yeah I agree with everything you are saying. He's doing quite well and looks like he could be an impact player once he really settles into the squad. I only meant that his preseason expectations weren't very high which is highlighted by the club's pursuit of Assaidi. My comment was more in defense of Sana 'cause the Swedish poster was being critical of a debut performance that I think a lot of us are really excited about.
so our winning streak is ended at 14, we're at 870 posts and it's the start of a new season. time for a new thread?