With a fifth placed finish in the bag and a European campaign to contend with, many NUFC fans felt that we’d see some strengthening of our squad over the summer.
Unfortunately that didn’t happen despite words from Alan Pardew early on in the transfer window when he dropped hints saying we were in for “a friend of Yohan Cabaye” and were also after “a goalscoring central defender” which essentially turned into much publicised and very drawn out transfer negotiations for Mathieu Debuchy, a former colleague and close friend of Cabaye from Lille, and Douglas from FC Twente.
Llambias has now gone on record to tell the world exactly why we failed to land either target. Speaking after the announcement of Alan Pardew’s new eight-year deal, dastardly Derek had this to say:
“Debuchy was a target and we were led to believe it would be around six million Euros but that was never the case, it was a lot bigger than that but it was pounds as well. We worked really hard on it and were keen to do the deal but if you can’t afford it…you can’t afford it. You can’t keep going down the road of saying, ‘Oh well it is only another two or three million.”
He added: “We went for several other targets including Douglas, they were just too pricey. We were nearly there but you can’t keep going back to get the price you want if there isn’t the appetite from the other side.”
So we were in for those players then, which I guess means Alan Pardew was telling the truth and not telling porkies like some believe.
I do get the concept of not paying what we can’t afford, but there comes a time when you just have to bite the bullet and pay a bit of money to strengthen the team.
At the moment there seems to be no alternative and we’ve ended up with pretty much nobody in areas earmarked for strengthening. We’re still light in central defence and we’re still light up front. That’s all fine though as we didn’t get ripped off in the process!
Don’t get me wrong, I’m pretty happy with things right now and really do back the fact that we go for not only the right player, but for the right kind of people, when it comes to incoming transfer dealings. However if you want the right thing, sometimes you have to be willing to be a bit more flexible to get it.
What do you make of it all?
I think he’s right. Why do people think football is any different from anything else? It doesn’t matter whether you’re buying a car, a house or a bar of soap: you work out what you can spend or are willing to spend, based on the impact and cost of not getting the deal. Then you stick to it. End of.
If they thought Debuchy was worth a certain amount to them, that certain amount took into account the added risk of underperformance. They shouldn’t then stump up another two or three million any more than you’d pay £8k for the car you’d decided you’d only pay £5k for.
It may lead to some frustrating windows, and some worrying seasons (er.. like this one) but it’s correct. Annoying, but correct.
Whumpie(Quote)
Aye, it’s a tough one to figure, especially in the case of Debuchy who now at something like £8mil is already fairly old, may take a while to settle and in turn may hamper the progress of Tavernier, who has a real chance to grab that right back spot next year-and challenge for it this year depending on the Simmo injury/contract situation.
It’s frustrating but this club obviously won’t pay over the odds for a player. If people want to blame that all on ashley being tight and greedy then fair enough, but of the legions of fans who proclaim “in Carr we trust”-perhaps they should realise that it will be Carr telling them who’s good, how good they are, and whether he thinks they’re worth it. He may not be involved in the negotiating aspect but he’ll be the no.1 when it comes to suggesting a figure.
Newkie(Quote)
“We can’t afford it”
So how much budget do we have per year exactly? three or four million? It’s just not good enough.
The Kid(Quote)
I do agree with the club policy of only paying what we feel the player is worth. The club wont spend a penny over what we take in , in revenue and im all for that.
Johno Toon(Quote)
What a load of **** and I hate to say it but I told you so 😀 when bloggers were on here after buying into the clubs PR mouthpiece Lee Ryder, stating that we had offered £6 mil but they upped it to £8mil and we shouldn’t be held to ransom.
So it was €6mil all along and thats for a talented full french international 😆 Lambastad must think all clubs are thick as *****.
The clubs transfer dealing in the last window were a disgrace, no matter what **** Lambastad comes of with, we won’t be held to ransom blah blah blah, I say it’s because they don’t want to pay going rate for quality players but rumage around in the bargain bin or damaged goods. But sure they know they’ll get away with it because enough fans buy the **** they come off with
Big Dave(Quote)
team for tomorow lads ————————————-
——————-harps :——————-
Tavinio—-STaylor—Colo—-Santon
————Tiote—Cabaye————-
—————-HBA———————
–Cisse———BA———sammy
stevo(Quote)
To be honest at this moment in time i would say the last transfer window was not too bad ,we should of signed another CB but Anita is looking good as a RB and Bigi looks a good stand in for Tiote . Come January we will be in a position to look at who’s available and it would not surprise me if a new CB came in then . As for a new striker i think it could always have been the plan to find out first if Senegal qualify for the ANC or not before spending in that department . If they dont we will not have too miss the 2 Dembas and that could determine how much money is spent on a CB and maybe another go for Debuchy .
Axel(Quote)
So Johno your happy enough for us to do without positions being strengthened like CB which even Jabba said 2 windows ago we needed a player in.
And thats not because the right player hasn’t been available because they have, and at a going rate not an inflated one.
but it’s simply down to the fact that we can’t get them to let us have a player with a value of £6mil for £4.5 because we have to get a bargain, so your happy enough with that ??
Big Dave(Quote)
Big Dave: in case you’ve not noticed, “the going rate for players” is unsustainable. The PL has a total debt of over £1Bn because of it. If our owner wants to just keep improving within its means while other clubs continue to rush over a cliff, I’m all for it.
All this shouting for more dosh is too reminiscent of my kid throwing a (thankfully rare) strop when I won’t buy him a toy.
Whumpie(Quote)
Yeah, it’s a shame Debuchy ended up going to a PL club that DID decide he was worth the extr… oh, wait. 🙄
Whumpie(Quote)
Whumpie in case you never noticed I said going rate not inflated. All this lying down and accepting whatever scraps that Jabba decides to throw down reminds me of an old pet I had that just accepted whatever he got 😉
Big Dave(Quote)
Dave your now trying to put words in my mouth. I am happy with the clubs policy of not spending money we dont have and sticking to a valuation of a player our scouting team have made. I do think we needed 2 more players brought in. However I do respect the clubs decision not to keep their powder dry and not panic buy and spend the extra couple of million. I do think the money is there. But I dont think there is enough there for us just to spend spend spend. We need to be sensible.
Johno Toon(Quote)
well ime with dave 100%,owlheed must think its feeding time at the zoo,throw them a few peanuts is his attitude imo 👿
icedog(Quote)
BD @ 11 – yep, we’re both talking about the same thing – the going rate. What many don’t get get – and I’m including a lot of very successful club owners here – is that the going rate is WRONG. It’s too high – it’s accelerated way ahead of revenues and is totally unsustainable. Any club paying the going rate for players right now – possibly excepting the ones like Manure with huge revenue streams – is going to crash. Big time.
Right now I’m just glad our club isn’t in the crowd of lemmings.
Whumpie(Quote)
Johno no im just trying to understand . So if your happy with the clubs transfer policy you must then accept and therefore be happy enough, that there is positions like CB that we might have to wait for 3-4 windows before the bargain replacement comes along ? Is that what your happy enough to go along with just so that we and our Billionaire owner save’s a few quid ❓
Big Dave(Quote)
The statement says we were led to believe the price was 6 million euro’s, but the price was changed significantly higher. Nowhere does it say we were not willing to pay the 6 million euros…. Not sure what told you so is all about unless you have evidence to the contrary? 😕
Shamrock(Quote)
Big Dave, at last someone who thinks for himself, dont believe the dribble that comes from lambias for one minute. The club is still millions in profit from transfer deals since the fat man came in,not to mention TV deals etc.
bazza(Quote)
Bazza, show us the figures then.
Shamrock(Quote)
Dave would you have been happy if we’d sold say HBA/Tiote/Cabaye or someone to fund new signings ❓
It’s for fans to say we should pay the going rate, but look around Everton/Spurs/Arsenal all made profits this window 😕
Sign of the times I’m afraid.
CB not signing was irresponsible.
But not signing a striker now looks fantastic.
I find it strange that the same people that wanted another back up striker are the same ones that are unhappy we didn’t field Ba/Cisse in the cup. Just when would this “back up striker” have played you’re wanting first team out for the cups.
At the end of the day, we can’t invest heavily in the squad based on getting to the Euros once. Only 5th place is guaranteed it. Too much of a gamble.
Instead we bought some promising youngsters. I’m pretty happy about that.
So, so unlikely that we’ll ever get Champions League by buying proven talent, much of it will have to be by developing players we can get for decent prices.
SolanosTrumpet(Quote)
He doesn’t actually say what the price was for Debuchy only that it was more than £ 6 million. It may have been £8 million or more that they were asking who knows. If the club don’t think the bloke was worth what was being asked then fair enough – I have no problem with that. They haven’t got too much wrong when it comes to bringing in players in the last couple of years- yes we could have done with a CB and striker but I’ll be patient just like when we waited to get Cisse.
3hourswasted(Quote)
Llambias says it wasn’t 6mil euros, it was more than that, and it pounds hence I gave the figure of £8mil +
Is he worth that? Not in my opinion. Although I would still have liked strengthening in other positions….can’t believe we’re back on this subject 😆
Newkie(Quote)
Sham the I told you so was that there was loads on this blog saying that we offered £6mil and I stated that that had came from the club’s free pr guru Lee Ryder that continually quoted our prices as Pounds rather than the true figure of Euros, while at the sametime quoting lille prices which were euros as pounds 😉 so yeah we probably were willing to pay €6mil but all along it was quoted as we offered them £6mil and fans bought that.
Big Dave(Quote)
See Cabaye is out of the Reading game with a tooth problem 🙁
maybe something to do with this from last year 😆 …
http://tinyurl.com/cqgnysr
3hourswasted(Quote)
Good on ya Dekka, thanks for clearing the air mate!! 🙂 🙂
aussie magpie fan(Quote)
Dave , I 100% back the clubs transfer policy. If it takes 3 or 4 transfer windows the get the right player at the right price I am ok with that. I do reserve the right to be dissapointed by things as well. Such as previous window. I felt we needed 2 more players in. We didnt get them due to the very transfer policy I support. These things happen in life. But I think its more important to keep our policy intact than to just to appease me. And its nothing to do with our billionaire owner. Once Ashley said the club needs to be self suffient his worth means nothing to us. He is not bankrolling us anymore so he could be worth 100 billion and wouldnt make a difference to us now.
Johno Toon(Quote)
Lets call a spade no human being is worth a Million pounds, Apart from Me 😆
Alex(Quote)
MEH
hitman(Quote)
One thing i would say on the Debuchy thing , is he was not needed as much as a CB . Once we signed Anita who can play both fullback positions we were well stocked in fullbacks , Simpson,Santon ,R Taylor, Perch and Tavernier , as well as at a push Ferguson means we have cover enough for LB & RB . I think 1 more CB in and we have enough Defensive cover ,although i would prefer 2 new CB’s and willo sold .
Axel(Quote)
There’s a big difference between “can’t afford it” and “not worth it”. I agree we shouldn’t buy players who arent worth the money and I look forward to the day we spend the Andy Caroll money on a player who is worth it.
Spartan(Quote)
@28- I agre with that. FB wasn’t a priority for us so I think 8M for Debuchy or whatever it was is a but much. I wouldn’t have minded that being spent on a class CB mind….
Dave- you going to get to watch much of the Ryder Cup? Looks like your countrymen have started off well as usual….
MDS(Quote)
@22, understood 🙂 @ spartan, cisse and ba not worth it then? NEWSFLASH: There is more to club economics than recent transfer fees. Especially one saddled with debt from previous unaffordable transfers…
Shamrock(Quote)
Douglas & his team say no offer from toon, who do you believe?
derek hardy(Quote)
I’m not that interested in anything Dekka has to say since he’s a proven liar in court . That aside not fussed about Debuchy really as I wasn’t convinced his defending ability is any better than Simmos but agree he does get forward more. Would of been a bonus but not the end of the world he didn’t arrive.My main gripe is over the lack of a CB really ,still think it borders on negligence that one never arrived ,not that I wanted Douglas mind ,liability that one with way too many agents. 😉
Re previous blog ,Jonas is a god and is one of our hardest grafters . Interesting stats on him Statto ,great job as usual. 😀
KIMTOON(Quote)
KIMTOON says:
September 28, 2012 at 15:58
I’m not that interested in anything Dekka has to say since he’s a proven liar in court .
———————–
That may be true Kim, what he says jives with the transfer policy put in place a couple of years back as well as with their other transfer dealings.
MDS(Quote)
In fairness, we all know a central defender should have came in as far back as January last season when Saylor got injured.
Shamrock(Quote)
Axel (with regard to fullbacks)
With Debuchy saga I never felt it was about us lacking players in that position, it was that we lacked quality in that position, had we sold Simpson in the window for 3/4m then I’m sure we would’ve secured Debuchy.
We no longer believe we’re desperate for a striker as Ba has hit form again and we know he won’t be played LW anymore. Add that to Campbell’s rise to the fringe of the 1st team and Shola being on standby we’re more at ease upfront.
CB obviously needs improvement and additions, it could be that Carr will find a bargain gem in which case great, this could take some time though and as that happens Good and Streete will mature and will hopefully have had some senior appearances. P.S I hope by that time Willo is long gone, a lost cause is that man.
Andymag(Quote)
MDS- He burnt his bridges with me ,Ican’t stand the man ,he has no class what so ever imo. I actually don’t hate MA ,and understand we need to be self funding but I don’t believe we are as skint as they like to make out at times .I don’t pretend to be a whizz on the clubs finances or owt but if we are so skint we can’t afford to pay for a quality CB then it’s a shame .
KIMTOON(Quote)
Kim while your feelings may be understandable it doesn’t mean everything the club says is a lie
MDS(Quote)
MDS your right it doesn’t mean that everything the club says is a lie, but it does mean you can’t trust or believe anything that they do say 😉
Big Dave(Quote)
Dave@39 😉
KIMTOON(Quote)
Advice for Dekka – let sleeping dogs lie!!
Toonsy – I totally agree with you!. Sometimes quality costs, though anyone who has ever stepped foot in a SD store will understand why that concept is lost on Ashley and Lambastard.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t agree with throwing money at trying to assembling a squad full of players, and prior to the summer I fully agreed with the way we performed in transfer windows.
But the reality, the summer was a bit of a crossroads for Newcastle, an opportunity to make some ground on the teams who have made up the top 4/5 for the last 10 or so years.
I accept what Lambias is saying, that you can’t spend an extra 2-3 mil on every transfer you go after, and I don’t think any fan wants to see the club do that (the Liverpool way, if you like).
But in fact is that we are probably a FB, CB and RW/CF shy of having a really strong squad.
I’m afraid that if you are going to have a wage cap, only sign players of a certain age and stick rigidly to your valuation of a player – then you are going to miss out and ultimately, in trying to strengthen the club, you are potentially weakening the squad.
I am fully behind the wage cap, and don’t believe we should change our position on that at all. But I do believe that we should consider players up to the age of 30yrs old. I also believe that if a player has been scouted thoroughly by Pardew and Carr and identified as a player who would be a first team player – such as Debuchy, then the board have a duty to get these players in!. If the selling clubs valuation is £5-10m off ours, I accept we walk away. However if the player has been well scouted that would never be the case, and the club should be prepared to pay £2-3m more to ensure that Pardew – who they clearly want at the helm – has the players he wants/needs to take the club forward.
Pardew has said this week he feels we are short at CB, and SSN is showing Colo is out of the Reading game due to a Hamstring injury, so I expect us to be active in Jan, and I’d hope that we have learn some lessons from the summer.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Sharpy well said Fella 😉 I agree with you that throwing money about wont work and tbh I haven’t heard anyone on here asking for that either.
I and others are just asking for Jabba to strengthen where needed with good quality players at decent prices. If as some say we wait around up to 2 yrs to get the right player at the price Jabba and co want to pay we could be falling short in the prem meaning that the £1-2mil that we save on the player will be wrote of by the loss in money from finishing lower in the prem.
Big Dave(Quote)
One thing I will say, even though I am fully behind their transfer policy, if they are signing players they are convinced will have a resale value, then why does a couple of extra million matter?
Case in point: Cisse.
He’s clearly worth much more than the price we paid, so I would have paid around 5 Million more for him if that’s what it took.
SolanosTrumpet(Quote)
BD- I guess I’m just not as cynical as some on here.
They’ve stuck to their policy and I commend them for it.
8m for debuchy is a joke
MDS(Quote)
MDS 8mil is that euros or pounds ??
ST 😉 same as Benny , Cabaye, Tiote etc etc are all worth a helluva lot more than we paid.
Lambastad and co go on about not being held to ransom and paying over inflated prices, and Pards had a go at inflated prices ruining the transfer window, yet they helped that by screwing the Dippers for more than what they wanted to pay and that was for a player that he( Lambastad) himsel said was worth fuk all,
the point I was trying to make earlier was that by not risking a couple of mil we could lose even more if we don’t make it high enough up the prem table, and we could risk losing player’s and cut our chances of signing good players if we fail to get back into Europe
Big Dave(Quote)
Yeah, I agree that 8mil quid (or more) is too much for Debuchy if the original talking point was 6mil euros – who was it that led them to believe 6mil euros, I wonder.
Brisvegas(Quote)