I'd bet on Mustafi staying. If we sell Chambers, I could see us bring Smalling in as a replacement, but I feel its more likely that we see no further first team additions or departures after Kos leaves (with the exception of Elneny going some time before the end of August).
Forest are apparently interested in Jenkinson. With respect to Smalling: Bailly is out injured for four months, so even though they added Maguire, United aren't that deep at CB. They'd be left with Jones, Lidelof, and Rojo to partner Maguire. Jones has trouble staying healthy and they are looking to move Rojo, so I seriously doubt Smalling would be available at any price.
Of course what this really means is we spent the last 3 months failing to sign a CB and now that is coming home to roost. Clock against Arsenal in CB search. Interest in Upamecano is there, but difficult to get a deal that big done in two days, although Leipzig obviously don't have to get a replacement by Thursday, they have the rest of the month. Loan bid rejected for Rugani, Juve want big fee. pic.twitter.com/Bk2krlSqCk— Charles Watts (@charles_watts) August 6, 2019
There is no longer any market for Utd & Arsenal brand offcasts now that smaller clubs have a lot of money and are more sophisticated. Some of them will be ditched in the last day firesale for sure. But with trash like Mozzer or Row Joe it probably makes more financial sense to keep them as depth due to the huge churn cost of signing someone to replace them who might not be better.
The classic mispronunciation of Rojo He's a very similar example of a trash player on a contract which makes offloading him very difficult. Back in the SAF days there would have been an ex-utd manager willing to do him a solid by taking him.
It also means our strategy was contingent on Koscielny being THE starter at CB which is just...so much facepalm
It makes sense that teams in the pl would focus on bringing guys in and then focus on sending guys out abroad after the window closes.
Everything is starting to kick off as we approach the final 48 hours of the window. Coutinho on loan is back on according to fairly reliable L'equipe journalist. Leipzig want Smith-Rowe as part of any deal for Upamecano. Kos is gone for €5m
The thing about the strong EPL cash flows is clubs can afford to hold out on the sales instead of churning cash like in the past where a lot of deals were debt financed. So a lot of times you shifted your dead weight early, to free up cash flow for the buying. So I agree, we will see players sold in the end of window fire sales if deals can be found, or even retained if necessary. But clubs can manage the ins and outs for weeks or months if they need to.
Cuntinho is silly. Why do we need him when we have Ozil, purchased a winger, and have the Real hotshot CM on loan?
It would be the stupidest thing we have done in a while. We won't even be able to fit Ozil in half of the time, so why do we need to Coutinho? Even if there was no loan fee at all, I wouldn't take him. Assuming we have an injury crisis in the attack, we have a lot of promising youngsters for those positions. Add in the heft loan fee and wage, and you have to wonder why we wouldn't just allocate those funds to get Tierney and Upamecano over the line instead.
We don't. Tim Stillman is speculating on Twitter that this may be the result of doing business with Kia Joorabchian, ie, you have to take his shit too if you want access to his gems.
If we can get Upamecano over the line, this will be our most impactful window in ages (and probably riskiest).
Never made much sense, but then again neither did Denis Suarez. If we loaned Coutinho that means someone in Barcelona has blackmail material on Sanllehi.
Yeah - that definitely is possible with the Raul approach Remember Bebe? Signed as a way to bung cash to Mendes
There were some rumors (don't know how solid) that he had some influence in the Pepe deal despite not being Pepe's agent.