Well sorry, i saw it on the official site. I hope this is someone we all know and want, and we make an impact.
My guess is wont be until mid july or so. I think SAF will bide his time somewhat and wait to see what some of the other big boys do, and most likely, wait to see what happens with stevie G. If he moves that could shake up things for lots of other teams.
Half the people in this Man Utd dont want Gerrard, because he is a scouser. They said they wouldnt be happy if he came. If anything i can recall that
As we don't seem to be moving for Baptista at all... I would think we're going to wait and wait and see which players go where before coming out for a player. The bad thing about this is that if that player rejects us we'll be in big trouble. Frankly, I'm amazed Fergie/Gill/management whatever think we are 1player away from completion And when are we ever gonna drop our saddlebags(deadweights) and set free????
Yup, another season of letting others get the talent while we be 'cautious'. And I think Ferguson doesn't let go of players who in his mind are determined and up for the cause, no matter how crappy they are. He only lets foreign players, and players who want to leave go. That's his major strength, as well as his major weakness. Hes very loyal to his players.
We should wait for Chelsea to act first. Chelsea can only sign one of Gerrard, Essien or any other world class midfield players because none of them would want to join a club if they cannot be gauranteed first team football. We obviously cannot compete with Chelsea financially. The idea situation is let them break their bank for Essien and we break ours for Gerrard. I don't care if Gerrard is scousers or not, as long as he and Rooney play well together.
I'm begining to wonder: what is the expected date that we're going to compete for the EPL? Right now, it's not on the horizon. We're maybe at replacement level, given our comparative amount of young/old talent. We're certainly not a year or two away. Talents like Rooney and Ronaldo have tremendous promise - but other players are fading. In many ways - I wish that the dreams for the title would fade. Don't get me wrong - I'm not urging a lack of ambition. But I personally - do not expect a title any time soon. Not in the next two years at least, absent material change that does not appear extant. And when we're constantly judged by the "did you win the title or not" standard: it just makes seasons seem like a failure, when perhaps they were not.
Chelsea have bid a British record fee according to this... http://sports.yahoo.com/sow/news;_y...0aA--?slug=reu-gerrard&prov=reuters&type=lgns
Chelsea are probably going to end up with Gerrard's signature...I can't see any club being able to compete with them financially. Frankly, he would be a very good Keane replacement, and Fergie himself said last year that Gerrard is on his way to becoming the best midfielder in the Premiership. It's a shame he'll end up at Chelsea. This probably clears the way for Essien's signature, although Chelsea have already made a mess of things by getting linked to him in the first place. Now that Lyon have said they don't want anything less than 26m, I think they'll expect us to fork out that amount of money. We might as well bid the 32m for Gerrard, but the Scouser-Manc rivalry will always be a problem, and Chelsea will just up their bid. Anyway, it seems that Arsenal will probably succeed on getting Baptista on the cheap, especially since no other club has publicly put in an offer for him. It's baffling, especially since if we can strike a deal with Sevilla, we could easily outmuscle Arsenal when it comes to Baptista's wages (ffs, we put Miller on 40K a week!).
i dont think gerrard is in our financial reach. we just can't compete with real madrid and chelsea ( Glazers might disagree, but wtf do they know)..... I would think if Chelsea do get Gerrard....we would be signing Essien. But I hope gerrard goes to Madrid, as im a big RM fan as well.
We will see what Gerrard says about this. If he goes to chelsea, i still wouldnt care, because its not working between Frank Lampard, and Gerrard in England, and it wont work for Chelsea. (hopefully)
What I hope is that Chelsea, by bidding now for Gerrard, have effectively called Lyon's bluff. I still maintain that the "more than £26m" remark was an attempt to milk as much from Chelsea as possible--I doubt a player like Essien would have gone for that much even at the peak of the transfer market. If they were to buy Gerrard, it would be highly unlikely they'd want Essien too, which could allow us to get Essien for much less.
Chelsea have overspent on most of their players, even if you compare it to 5 years ago when the market was insane. That said, if Chelsea is not bidding for Essien, I'd think that Lyon would take 15-20 mill pounds from Man U, if Chelsea signs Gerrard and does not pursue Essien. Honestly, it wouldn't surprise me at all if Chelsea tried to buy Essien after buying Gerrard, with the condition that Essien leaves from Lyon to Chelsea next summer. Makelele isn't exactly a spring chicken, therefore Chelsea could possibly try and pair up Gerrard and Essien in the middle for 2006-2007. Considering how Chelsea has "undercut" Man U in the transfer market the last 2 years, I can't see Chelsea letting Man U sign Essien for something relatively cheap, such as 10 mill pounds or so.
We'd be far more likely to do that with Mascherano rather than Essien. As for the usual "Gerrard and Lampard can't play together" comments - please keep in mind England doesn't play a 4-3-3. We do.
I couldn't care less where Gerrard goes. I am worried about us losing out big time over this window, however. I hope we're pulling strings in the background...
Right and wong. When the ball is fed from the defence, Gerrard & Lampard work fantastically well together, as Gerrard tends to sit a little deeper than Lampard and play longer passes in general, while Frank is more direct and makes more runs into the box. They haven't worked well together because there hasn't been a pure destroyer with them to get them the ball (as while both are combatative CMs, neither are true defensive mids (or at the level of Keane is his prime). With Makalele back there to do all the dirty work (plus Robben/Cole & Duff pressing on the wings) that is one seriously dangerous midfield. Quite arguably the best in Europe... to go with their best-in-Europe back 4 and their worldclass keeper.
But as long as they have Drogba or Gudjonson upfront there is always hope. What's the odds they sign Andriano now.
They're closing in on Gilardino, who's class. I think their plan is to play a 4-3-3 of ------------------Cech------------------ Ferreira----Terry---Carvalho----Del Horno --------Gerrard---Makelele---Lampard---- ---------Robben---Gilardino---Duff------- Now you tell me which one signing will make our team complete enough to push the above for the title. Sure, if United are to make only 1 more signing, it's bound to be a class act, say Essien or, for those who still think there's some hope there, Gerrard. SAF seems to think that the old 3 (Giggs, Scholes, Keane) can lead the push for the title, provided their cover is adequate (Park, say Essien). However, even with the 25m figure that now seems to be the lowest possible figure the Glazers are planning to allow SAF to spend this year, we could well replace them right now. Park on the left, Ronaldo on the right, Baptista and another signing (of around 10m, since Baptista seems to be bound to leave for around that mark himself). One signing isn't good news to me. But I do feel that SAF may just be planning long-term, having realistically concluded that we cannot catch up with Abramovic in one transfer window, in which they're bound to anyway spend more than us. But no title in the next 2/3 years? I don't really agree. Ed van der Sar probably has around 3/4 top years left in him. The backline does too, maybe with Wes as RB in the next 2/3 years, and with 1 top signing should Mikael fail to turn the tide. The attack is good; I do feel that Ruud will bounce back from the injuries, and few doubt that when fit he's good for even another 5 years. Rooney's getting better every second. Saha's just pledged to fight it out, after reassurances from Fergie that he has a long-term future at United, and Smith is a great squad player to have. So now the midfield: Park and Ronaldo will be at their best in the next couple of years, or very near to it. Should Essien be the 1 man we're going for, we have a solid DM for, hell, the best part of the next DECADE. So that only leaves 1 midfield position uncatered for. Darren Fletcher is backed by Fergie, but should he fail to make it I have full faith that Fergie will get someone capable. Should Essien be signed, Fletcher's probably too defencive to be his future CM partner. Maybe SAF plans to play Park and Essien in the middle, Ronaldo on the left and Fletcher on the right??? In any case, we're looking at Fletcher and Silvestre being the main questionable positions in the team in the long-term (that's taking Essien as our 1 remaining signing). Next season we then have 25 MILLION POUNDS to spend on those positions. And 25 million the next year. Say we sign a class attacking midfielder, maybe a more developed Schweinsteiger, next year for about 20. 5 goes on talent like Park. Then a class CB, maybe King or Kompany 2 years from now, for another 20m. Title in 3 years. We could sort both the CM and CB positions next season, with the transfer market settling back to its realistic state and United tax nearing it's end. Hell, if Baptista can leave for around 10m pounds, 25 can get us 2 SUPERB players I'm confident Saf will bring us the title in the next few years. As for this season; I'll be the last man to write United off at the start of a season, and it's still my hope. That said, I wouldn't be gutted to end 2nd with the FA Cup and a good European campaign.