Sports The Football Discussion Thread!

>tekkers

HAHAHAH, oh God I'm dying here.

Sigh Welbeck sometimes I don't know what to say about him. Scores against Madrid and I jump and smile then that's it from him. Preseason he looks stupid against Thai All Stars and then we see him score two against the A league team.

He's a frustrating young man enough said

I was reading this article about how overrated Welbeck is and it said "Welbeck has 17 goals in 91 Premier League appearances which is a goal every 5.3 games." and " He also has 15 assists in 103 games for Manchester United." Just 15 assist in 103 matches? Wow that seems really low to me.

Especially when you think he's playing in a team that scores for fun.

Fresh Quagliarella reports. I don't think the club would waste this much time on a player that they don't have a chance of signing, this could really be great. Going from Holt/Jackson/Martin/Kane/Morrison to van Wolfswinkel/Hooper/Becchio in a year is already impressive but adding guy of this class into the mix would be something else.

I admire Chris Hughton, I think he's a proper football manager. It's even more admirable when you think of the treatment he got at Tottenham (not as manager albeit) and Newcastle yet he doesn't seem to be that bitter about it.

Or he just has a good poker face.

Everyone has been asking for an incredibly huge transfer and I think the one closest to happening is Bale. Despite Tottenham constantly rejecting bid after bid if Madrid actually go up to 93 million euros like the reports say they are I would sell him in an instance.

I'm not a Spurs fan so I don't know what they're thinking about all Bale news but I honestly don't think any player is worth that much (Except for the great CR7............maybe Messi) and It seems foolish for them to turn down such a massive offer.

Whats your take on the matter?

If Madrid want a player it is only natural for the selling club to get as much out of the deal as possible. Is he worth that sort of fee? Probably not. Media propaganda sure can inflate a transfer fee.

Pace, power and shooting are the only parts of his game that are top class, enough to beat most sides tbh. I think he's only assisted 15 times over the last 3 seasons, although playing around better players might give him the motivation needed to pass the ball.

He scored a great goal past my lot last season. He picked it up in his own half and just ran through the entire team before smashing it past the keeper. It was one of those moments where the defenders were backing off when they should have been tripping him over.

It looks like Bale is staying put regardless of the fee offered due to Daniel Levy's insanity.

Not sure if you've all heard, but former Birmingham striker Christian Benitez has died at 27 with heart failure. Horrible to hear R.I.P.

Not exactly insanity, but he was pretty annoyed with the way they got Modriç last year and keeps a grudge against Madrid so he said he just won't negotiate at all. 150 € million or nothing. And Pérez needs a star signing since all the youth players he got aren't anything spectacular and the persistent rumour of Ronaldo getting ready to move to United as soon as his contract expires is stronger as ever- and they'll need someone to fill his leadership role.

Levy has been notorious in the past for holding out for ridiculous sums of money for players as well though. Even with a grudge, anything above £60m for Bale would seem very acceptable if I held him position. If Madrid really do end up bidding around 100m Euros (no Euro symbol on my laptop for some reason which saddens me) then it should definitely be accepted.

As long as he moves eventually, I'll be happy anyway. This would certainly be the big transfer I'm waiting for.

Levy is pretty bad. I mean in a business sense he's fine but is that really best for them on the pitch? No. Replacing Modric with Dempsey was just silly.

Well his business sense would tell him to take £80m for a player who has played one good season, especially since Tottenham can't or won't invest enough to actually progress even with him in the team.

Anyway SSN is now reporting a £85m bid has been made, a lot more credible than the papers saying it.

Couple of interestingish transfers today.

Big one is obviously Soldado. A lot of money for a 28 year old but I guess he'll get some of the goals they'll lose with Bale moving on.

QPR got Austin from Burnley, good signing.

Two Norwich players have moved to Championship clubs. Leon Barnett to Wigan and Andrew Surman to Bournemouth. Both very important parts of the Norwich promotion team of a couple of years ago. Now if David Fox and Daniel Ayala move on my prediction would end up being spot on.

Is Albert Adomah to Boro happening? I expect hat would be slightly more exciting than your other signings thus far.

If Soldado plays well in the BPL that is. :P I can see them getting a poor return on that one.

Hopefully QPR have just stepped further into the breaches of the Financial Rules. Something tells me they won't get promoted this season and it'll be funny to see them punished when they don't.

Adomah would be very exciting, but then we've been linked with a lot of exciting players and they've all fallen through for one reason or another. I'm not going to get my hopes up about him until he's confirmed as a Boro player. We'd still need a few more players on top of that to do well this season anyway.

We could've done with Barnett, we have a shortage of centre backs.

Just watched DA SWANZ in Yurop and they look very good. I know it was only Malmo but this might be the season that they finally win me over. I imagine the strike force of Bony and Michu isn't one Moyes would want to face so early in the season.

Norwich also have the need for a new central defender. There are currently 4 in the squad but one of these is Daniel Ayala, I think I'm only slightly less likely of being registered in the squad come the 15th than this fellow. Skybet still have Norwich as favourite to sign Toby Alderlongname, seems like he's holding out for a Liverpool or Spurs move though.

The Skybet odds for transfers are pretty slow to update so I wouldn't read too much into that. Although snooping around the odds I see Rooney is 8/15 to join Chelsea and 4/7 to leave to anyone (as opposed to 5/4 for staying), it seems like they know something.

I've always liked Swansea since they came up, they play good football and last season they had that beautiful gold detail kit (completely ripped of R.Madrid a season before it but still) which was gorgeous.

I have to say Caulker's move away from Spurs made me doubt it even more, I certainly wouldn't be heartbroken if he ends up lining up against Norwich next season. Although I'm not totally sure if there has actually been any fresh Spurs interest.

Nuke - noticed how Madrid's kit last season resembled Swansea's from the season before? Adidas getting real lazy. Although at least for Madrid they changed black to dark blue.

Lapras - longname is actually Toby Alderwield, btw. (may not be spelt right, but its not that long). And is Ajax seriously considered on par with Norwich? Unlike Norwich (and Liverpool and Spurs) they get Champions League football.

On the topic of Bale - Spurs should cash in, he may well become more inconsistent after one good half-season (I mean, he destroyed Inter then fell of the radar for a couple of years, what if this is just a more prolonged spell of good, then he'll next hit good form playing for Carlisle United in 2016?). Alright harsh example, but still - squeeze about £60m, Di Maria and Coentrao out of Perez and Spurs are in business. Not just in terms of being rich, but of being likely to keep Arsenal out of the CL next season.

I haven't been on this thread a while, but what was with the Welbeck bashing? I can understand if you dislike United, or are disdainful of his club form but as far as the national side goes, he's got a better goals-games ratio than most of our national strikers. Plus, he's been stuck out on the wing a lot because United got RVP and Chicharito hit form too. Perhaps Sturridge would be a better fit, playing in front of Rooney, but Welbeck's hardly unworthy of the shirt.

Alderweireld. 12 letters is pretty long.

Norwich are a smaller club than Ajax but they are a smaller club playing in a bigger league. A bigger league which if he impresses in he'll be off to a bigger club than Ajax in no time. I can't imagine the likes of Leroy Fer, Ricky van Wolfswinkel and Gary Hooper see Norwich as the final destination in their careers.

Norwich are very much a side on the up though. In 2009 this happened and now they are tailing players like Fabio Quagliarella after finishing 12th and 11th in the Premier League.