January Transfer Speculation and Shit

[Grebbo]

Tbh the player himself is an idiot. Should have gone to Ajax or another Belgian/Dutch club known for working with young players.

Chances are we won't ever hear from him again and he'll get lost in Real Madrid's BS.

An idiot? No... he could get a career ending injury at any time. He'd be an idiot not to go to RM for £80k pw.

If it doesn't work out he can drop down a level and he'd still only be 20 ish (not sure how long his contract is).

[adzzzbatch]

united want paulista, no doubt we'll bend over backwards in order to help them get their man.

[She Wore A Yellow Ribbon]

He looks a bit like Keown.

Wonder if he's an aggressive nutter like him too.

[Power n Glory]

An idiot? No... he could get a career ending injury at any time. He'd be an idiot not to go to RM for £80k pw.

If it doesn't work out he can drop down a level and he'd still only be 20 ish (not sure how long his contract is).

That's a another way of looking at it. Very true. He has enough time on his hands to sort his career out if things go wrong at Real.

[Niall_Quinn]

Having to hire the parents isn't the greatest development we've seen in the game. Says a lot about the parents and their idea of what sport is. Hope it doesn't rub off on the kid.

[Power n Glory]

Having to hire the parents isn't the greatest development we've seen in the game. Says a lot about the parents and their idea of what sport is. Hope it doesn't rub off on the kid.

We can't judge. If I could hook my parents up with a job so there set for life, I would.

Wouldn't you?

[The Emirates Gallactico]

Another one of "Wenger's misses"

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/30945201

Arsene Wenger: Visa denied Arsenal's Angel Di Maria move

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has revealed he was unsuccessful in signing a 17-year-old Angel Di Maria due to work permit regulations.
The Frenchman wants restrictions for non-European Union players to be scrapped as he tries to sign centre-half Gabriel Paulista from Villarreal.
He suggested Home Office criteria prevented him from signing Manchester United's Di Maria nine years ago.
"We wanted him to come here," said Gunners boss Wenger.

Di Maria, 26, signed for Manchester United from Real Madrid for a British record £59.7m in August.
Wenger said: "We had identified Di Maria when he was 17 in an international competition.
"But he went to Portugal, and from Portugal he went to Spain. Why? Because he could not get a work permit for England, so that meant you could only get him to England once he was worth a huge amount of money."

Wenger needs Home Office approval if he is to complete the signing of Paulista because the 24-year-old is yet to represent Brazil.
The Gunners boss has criticised proposals to reduce the number of non-European Union passport holders in the English game next season.
He said: "Ideally it would open completely, and anyone could come in."
Currently, the work permit requirement for non-EU passport holders is that they have to be an international from a country ranked within Fifa's top 70 and have played 75 per cent of their country's international matches in the last two years.
In order to sign Paulista, they would have to convince the Home Office that the defender was an "exceptional talent".
The Football Association wants to reduce the number of non-EU players within English football by up to 50%.

But Wenger thinks scrapping the regulations would be better for young English players.
"You could close completely the borders of the country and play only with English players. What will that do? That will kill the attractiveness of the Premier League worldwide.

"The second option is to say 'look we have the best league in the world, so let's produce the best players in the world'.
"One thing is for sure, if you put a young player with top-level players, he has more chance to develop. If you put him with average players he has more chance to remain average."

Add him to the Ronaldo, Ibramhaovic, Yaya Toure, Messi etc etc pile.


Mind you, I do remember a false rumour spread by a certain "dead poster" about us being interested and signing Di Maria back in 2007 right before he moved to Benfica so there may be some truth to this after all.

[Niall_Quinn]

van Moyes is trying to hijack the Paulista deal, apparently. He's a player the overrated Dutch charlatan has wanted for a long time, in fact ever since we expressed an interest. He's also signing Hummels, Pogba, Cavani, Messi, so a very busy window for the arch incompetent.

[Power n Glory]

How the hell did we get work permits for Song and Denilson? We must have been slipping someone the brown paper bag to get those guys over. Without a doubt that guys been fired now because we're getting no favours on the work permits.

[Japan Shaking All Over]

God I hate that Van Moyes, Van Morrison, Van Winkle......in fact vans in General can go do one