Comolli - The Verdict

[DigitalTron]

Make your own assessment, but here are the £170M of Damien Comolli's transfers. I've done a tally, and the ones I wanted to do came up to about £53M'ish and include most of the highly rated players. The ones that I wasn't in favor of doing--some because of quality, some because they were fliers with which I was ambivilent, and some who I thought were overpriced and unneeded (Bent, Bentley, etc.)--are grossly expensive.

How much would you have spent and how much would you have saved?

Here is the link (http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/2009/01/25/tottenham-have-spent-almost-170million-on-flop-players-since-2005-115875-21069815/).

-Digital

[Hauler]

There are some very good players on that list but some are just.... my god.

[jumhed]

Only Gilberto and Rocha are actual crap. The rest are good, but lets face it, an actual team hasn't been created. Throwing money and players at it hasn't helped. A period of stability will help.

[DigitalTron]

Heheh, Jumhed are you actually now defending the likes of Danny Murphy, Ghaly, Mido and Alnwick? :D

-Digital

[jumhed]

Heheh, Jumhed are you actually now defending the likes of Danny Murphy, Ghaly, Mido and Alnwick? :D

-Digital

Danny Murphy was okay, Ghaly was okay, Mido started very well until he got injured, and Alnwick is a highly rated youngster not ready for the massive job that is First XI GK (he was England U21 keeper for a while I believe).

So they're not crap players, just not suited to whatever bizarre system the current whoever manager is playing.

And I don't think I've seen a worse defender at the Lane than Gilberto, except that Italian kid that Gross signed who was utter, utter crap


None of them are fit to lace Taricco's boots though.

[AudereEstFacere]

I approve of:

Ghaly, BAE, Berbatov, Pekhart, Chimbonda, Malbranque, Bale, KPB, Kaboul, Rose, Hutton, Woodgate, Modric, GDS, Bostock, Gunter, and Corluka

totalling... just over 95 million.

I like a lot of these players and think they had potential or served the club well. Just my opinion.

[dashiel]

berbatov, woodgate, modric, pavlyuchenko, corluka

[Phillyspur]

I'm just sick of being front and center every transfer window. I want Redknapp to build a team and Levy to have the patience to let him. A whole team, not just a collection of fancy names. We shouldn't have to be buying 3 10m+ players every 6 months.

[Spur_Forever]

Frankly, when viewed in isolation, this is a good list. Some not-so-great buys, but overall the quality far exceeds the crap.

The problem is the lack of coordination between Commolli and the Coach, leading to a waste of resources and an unbalanced team. Buying Bent when we already had Berba, Keane and Defoe is the prime example, which in turn led to the lack of funds for a world class DM (which a then 5th placed Premier League club with its sights on Champions league should have had no problem securing).

So my problem with Comolli is not buying players who weren't good enough (even though a few slipped through the cracks) but rather not buying what the team needed at the crucial time.

[Teso Dos Bichos]

For an outside perspective...

Dimitar Berbatov - £10.9m - Always a good striker and very good price
Steed Malbranque - £2m - Good quality attacking midfielder, good workrate, cheap
Mido - £4.5m - Good squad striker
Gareth Bale - £5m - One for the future
Alan Hutton - £9m - Great all-round right-back
Jonathan Woodgate - £8m - Very good central defender when fit
Vedran Corluka - £8.5m - Good all-round defender

Total - £47.9m
Saving - £121.6m

The comments in regard to building a team instead of a stacked squad of players is spot on.

[DigitalTron]

Danny Murphy was okay, Ghaly was okay, Mido started very well until he got injured, and Alnwick is a highly rated youngster not ready for the massive job that is First XI GK (he was England U21 keeper for a while I believe).

So they're not crap players, just not suited to whatever bizarre system the current whoever manager is playing.

Fair enough. There is probably enough in there for reasonable minds to differ. :)

And I don't think I've seen a worse defender at the Lane than Gilberto, except that Italian kid that Gross signed who was utter, utter crap


None of them are fit to lace Taricco's boots though.

By this comment I'm assuming that you're not characterizing the Dmid Kazayuka Toda as a defender because he's not on the back line. I'm in no way trying to defend Gilberto ... it's just that Toda was in a class all by himself, lol.

I completely agree about Tano though ... complete committment to the team.

-Digital

[jumhed]

Fair enough. There is probably enough in there for reasonable minds to differ. :)



By this comment I'm assuming that you're not characterizing the Dmid Kazayuka Toda as a defender because he's not on the back line. I'm in no way trying to defend Gilberto ... it's just that Toda was in a class all by himself, lol.

I completely agree about Tano though ... complete committment to the team.

-Digital

Paolo Tramezzani..thats his name! He was a Left Back. He sucked arse!
toda was awful, but a midfielder.

[soccernutter]

In terms of purchases, I think there are three basic questions that need to be considered:
1 - Are they good enough to buy
2 - Is the price acceptable/reasonable (ala Kaka, Buffon, et al)
3 - Is the player important to the team (fills a spot, good squad player, etc)

Based on those three questions, we should look at the purchases without hindsight. Guys like Kaboul had tons of potential, but was a purchase at the wrong time - we needed an immediate fill in for King, not somebody based on potential (plus, he was over priced). With that, here is my list:

Danny Murphy - £2m - filled the need for a good price.
Benoit Assou-Eketto - £3.5m - young and with potential, even if he has not made the impact hoped for
Dimitar Berbatov - £10.9m -the best purchase we made
Steed Malbranque - £2m - quality and cheap
Gareth Bale - £5m - young and filled in immediately
Alan Hutton - £9m - took the spot, even if the price was a touch high
Jonathan Woodgate - £8m - excellent purchase
Luka Modric - £16.6m - filled a need if not yet lived up to the purchase price.
Vedran Corluka - £8.5m - another excellent purchase

And I will never look down on youth purchases for a small price. Giovani never had a place in the team. Taarabt can do magic with the ball, but still needs to develop. At this point, he is a waste, IMO, because of price.
Tomas Pekhart - £1m
Danny Rose - £1m
John Bostock - £700,000
Chris Gunter - £2m

For me, that is a purchase price of £70.2m with a saving of about £100m

Players that I think never should have been purchased are Pavo, Bently, Kaboul, and Gomez. Guys who I think should have had their price cut before purchase are Bent, Boatang (even if he never worked out), Mido and Taarabt

[jumhed]

In terms of purchases, I think there are three basic questions that need to be considered:
1 - Are they good enough to buy
2 - Is the price acceptable/reasonable (ala Kaka, Buffon, et al)
3 - Is the player important to the team (fills a spot, good squad player, etc)

Based on those three questions, we should look at the purchases without hindsight. Guys like Kaboul had tons of potential, but was a purchase at the wrong time - we needed an immediate fill in for King, not somebody based on potential (plus, he was over priced). With that, here is my list:

Danny Murphy - £2m - filled the need for a good price.
Benoit Assou-Eketto - £3.5m - young and with potential, even if he has not made the impact hoped for
Dimitar Berbatov - £10.9m -the best purchase we made
Steed Malbranque - £2m - quality and cheap
Gareth Bale - £5m - young and filled in immediately
Alan Hutton - £9m - took the spot, even if the price was a touch high
Jonathan Woodgate - £8m - excellent purchase
Luka Modric - £16.6m - filled a need if not yet lived up to the purchase price.
Vedran Corluka - £8.5m - another excellent purchase

And I will never look down on youth purchases for a small price. Giovani never had a place in the team. Taarabt can do magic with the ball, but still needs to develop. At this point, he is a waste, IMO, because of price.
Tomas Pekhart - £1m
Danny Rose - £1m
John Bostock - £700,000
Chris Gunter - £2m

For me, that is a purchase price of £70.2m with a saving of about £100m

Players that I think never should have been purchased are Pavo, Bently, Kaboul, and Gomez. Guys who I think should have had their price cut before purchase are Bent, Boatang (even if he never worked out), Mido and Taarabt


This post is filled with logic and as such has no place on these forums. :p

[pookspur]

a director of football has one responsibility - put a squad together within a certain budget.

well, the budgeting part doesn't mean much, as we spend like hiltons. but look at what was in place when he arrived. then look at what was there when he left. i don't see how it's defensible. anyone who rates comolli as anything other than an utter failure is baffling to me. he decimated our squad, regardless of how much 'talent' he may have left us with.

looking at players and prices, and saying 'good buy' or 'bad buy' is all good fun, but it's not an exercise in buying players - the job is building a squad.

comolli sucked the big one.

[pookspur]

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=614142&sec=england&cc=5901

and so the verdict is ...


... it's all berbatov's fault.

it kind of makes you wonder whether or not we might have been playing hardball with berbatov - not for the bigger price tag, but to keep him ... as man u was able to do in the 'ronaldo-to-madrid' issue. i'm not sure if that would alter my perception of levy and comolli regarding the episode or not. they still got it very wrong in the end. but somehow it makes the colossal blunder of not having another striker in place slightly more palatable.

maybe. i don't know. how could anyone not know that berbatov was either going, or going to be worthless for us? just not a big comolli (nor levy, regarding personell) fan, i guess.

[jumhed]

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=614142&sec=england&cc=5901

and so the verdict is ...


... it's all berbatov's fault.

it kind of makes you wonder whether or not we might have been playing hardball with berbatov - not for the bigger price tag, but to keep him ... as man u was able to do in the 'ronaldo-to-madrid' issue. i'm not sure if that would alter my perception of levy and comolli regarding the episode or not. they still got it very wrong in the end. but somehow it makes the colossal blunder of not having another striker in place slightly more palatable.

maybe. i don't know. how could anyone not know that berbatov was either going, or going to be worthless for us? just not a big comolli (nor levy, regarding personell) fan, i guess.

Berbs was at the end of his second year of his contract. At the end of his third year, he could buy his own contract out for a lot less than £30mil that Spurs received for him.

So basically, Levy (quite rightly imo), cashed in.

[pookspur]

Berbs was at the end of his second year of his contract. At the end of his third year, he could buy his own contract out for a lot less than £30mil that Spurs received for him.

So basically, Levy (quite rightly imo), cashed in.

right, i agree.

that said, there's a difference between 'cashing in' and trying to milk said 'cash in' for every last dime to the detriment of the team. so, yeah, perhaps levy got us a few extra million by putting fergie off 'til the very last day; but how much more than that have we sqandered in trying to right the ship?

same result, either way, though, isn't it? i mean, whether he was trying to milk the deal for all it was worth, or simply trying to keep berbatov, the end result had a pretty bad effect on the team.

now, whether that's more attibutable to levy or comolli, i don't know. but i suspect it's the former, which could be why comolli is headlining it in his own defense.

[DigitalTron]

Berbs was at the end of his second year of his contract. At the end of his third year, he could buy his own contract out for a lot less than £30mil that Spurs received for him.

So basically, Levy (quite rightly imo), cashed in.

I agree completely jumhed. Another thing worth mentioning is that it was a well publicized rumor that we had a gentleman's agreement with Berbs to let him go if we couldn't achieve Champion's League football by this season. We didn't, and he really wasn't a jerk about things in public, and he still hasn't badmouthed the club (that's what agents are for right?). The rumor was probably true too, but even if it wasn't the perception in the public still exists. So, if Levy had played hardball with Berbs and forced him to stay an extra season (meaning we'd lose more money), it would also affect our chance to bring in top players using similar gentleman's agreements.

While Levy has made his share of mistakes, I don't think he's made one regarding Berbs at any stage. Carrick, sure; Jol, sure; and there's plenty of others, but Berbs shouldn't be on that list IMHO.

-Digital

[sendorange]

The club should have signed Carrick to a 5 year deal when they bought him for West Ham, 4 years was too short. or at least given him a new contract after his first year when his top level ability was apparent. Levy was far too tight on the wages with him and that took away our ability to hold onto him, although maybe Comolli convinced him that Zokora would adequately replace him so there was no need to bust a gut keeping Carrick for longer.

The problem with Comolli's list, is where is the starting quality left wing? where is the midfield general? Those are the big holes that we all saw and were never filled, just kept buying players in positions where we already had starters.