tomh621

Not keen on this Boilesen link, apparently he really is awful 

Seems to be the Bennet of Ajax, the fans dont like him either. 

 

 

Carroll has potential but I always feel he is an idiot that he turned down spell on loan at Ajax for a role at QPR

I think he was correct there, Dutch football is Championship standard at best IMO. Ajax have a nice big stadium but that's about it. Even Dutch people don't talk about Dutch football much.

I think that's a bit harsh. It's not as good as a few years ago with players like Suarez, Vertonghen or Eriksen, but the top teams are still better than championship standards

 

Some have amazing academies and some of the players to come out of the Dutch league have/are world class. 

Wire me £200 and I'll stick it on for ya...

What a nice gesture - must be legit!

Would take KEA over Sanchez..

Suit yourself! Sanchez is a different type of player and evidently far better (considering his international performances). Then again I think they've both not really played in their best roles. 

 

bickering over re-signing Downing.

Panicking we'll lose Delph for a fee that gets lower every day.

Waiting for Benteke and Vlaar to leave.

Linked to nothing but average or risky players, foreign players no-one has heard of whose agents are using us to ramp up fees for the genuine buyers. Links to expensive goalkeepers we didn't think we needed.

The good feeling generated by signing Richards certainly went quickly.

Says more about our fans than reality. Complaining about links. Complaining about players we haven't signed. Complaining about what the manager might do. And all without any basis in fact.

People need to get a goddamn grip.

 

In my opinion this is one of the few times complaints have been fully justified. 

Whats this obsession with Heaton?! We've got far more pressing issues to attend to before buying a keeper. 

 

Are others nervous about our lack of signings thus far or is it to early in the window to start worrying?   

 

It's too early.

 

We already know we won't be doing much until this takeover malarky is done. Still got until end of august. 

 

Sell him for 30m buy dembele & cabaye & remy

rather keep Delph tbh

 

I'd probably sell Delph for Dembele, Cabaye & Remy… dare I say… 

What would 'silly money' be for Delph? In a world where sterling and his transfer request are 50m, Delph, as captain and a new contract, with man city absolute desperate for home grown players, I'd say Delph would have to be in a similar bracket.

Reports city enquired what it might take and we just outright told them to jog on, hope that's true.

Anything above 35 would be getting silly I reckon. Would anyone say no to 35 million for Delph? We could get 2 Delphs for that I reckon. 'Delph' is starting to sound funny now. Delph. 

Instead of sending Gil out on loan why not use him as part of the first team squad?

 

And as for replacing Guzan - we have more urgent positions to fill with quality players before we should even consider a new keeper.

Id like to see him in the squad too, I was just responding to someone suggesting we sell him if he's not being used.

I wanted to answer this question statistically, and after a bit of searching I found this blog post, which is the only place I can find comprehensive datasets about Premier League goalkeepers:

 

http://www.sportingintelligence.com/2015/06/11/sommer-pips-neuer-and-buffon-as-best-moneyball-keeper-as-de-gea-intrigue-continues-110601/

 

The guy attempts to statistically analyse all of the goalkeepers who played more than 15 games in Europe's 5 biggest leagues. The results are contained in a spreadsheet you can download if you follow the link. He says:

 

'So who are the best goalkeepers in Europe, objectively speaking?'

 

'An attempt to answer that in this piece of statistical analysis throws up some interesting possibilities, based on a ‘Safe Hands’ rating (SHR) that considers the measurable parts of a goalkeeper’s job.'

 

. . . 

 

'For the position of goalkeeper, however, the irksome task of quantifying individual performances is dramatically eased. A solid 50 per cent of a goalkeeper’s four main responsibilities – making saves, claiming crosses, organising the defence and distribution – are fairly easily quantifiable, and those are the first two: saves and crosses.'

 

'It is probably impossible to objectively assess the defensive organisational skills of a goalkeeper because the whole team, and particularly the back four, are accountable for a team’s defending, whilst any serious attempt at determining whether a distributive throw or a kick has been ‘good’ or not relies to a degree upon the heading and positional prowess of a goalkeeper’s outfield team-mates.'

 

'As far as shot-stopping and cross collection are concerned, however, the issues are fewer and further between. It turns out to be actually quite easy to compare goalkeepers based upon the proportion of saves they make for every shot they face, and upon the proportion of crosses that they successfully catch. The model used here also factors in punches, rating them worse than a catch but better than a failed claim.'

 

In answer to your first demand, about being 'dominant in the air', the following goalkeepers all claimed a higher percentage of crosses and punched less frequently than Guzan:

 

Forster / Courtois / Begovic / De Gea / Foster / Heaton / Adrian / Pantilimon

 

In answer to the request for world class saves, I accept that of course he has made some, though in my view there have been fewer than in previous seasons. 

 

As far as crap defenders go, those don't affect his save percentage or percentage of crosses claimed or whatever. 

 

I'm not saying you have to accept this analysis, and of course you can do anything with statistics, but what I am trying to show is that on none of these metrics does Guzan stand out from his peers. 

 

I mostly agree that defenders dont have an impact on shot to save ratio. In a nutshell a better keeper will save more of the shots that are fired at him. But I dont agree with the percentage of crosses claimed - defenders, as well as other things, can have a significant impact on that. 

Isn't Firmino a replacement for Sterling?

 

They sell Sterling for £45-50m, bring in Firmino and Benteke. 

 

Would be good business if you ask me. 

He's not a winger though. Although Sterling will often cut inside Firmino always plays through the middle and often becomes a striker. 

 

 

 

 

12m + Dembele and Townsend would do me just fine.

 

You rate Dembele and Townsend as being worth 20mil? Really? Are you Levy?!

 

 

Both Dembele and Townsend have to be worth £10m each in this day and age I would have thought?

 

Not saying I would accept it, but the valuation can't be far off?

 

 

I think they're worth closer to 10 combined. Both haven't shown much in quite a while now.

 

 

a] You're assuming Benteke is valued at £32m there

b] Townsend is, for whatever reason, at least a £10m player in the current market.  We've got people saying Fabian Delph is worth £20m on another thread - Townsend is younger, playing for a better team and also in the England squad.

 

Delph is of much higher value/importance to us than Townsend is to spurs - dont forget that!

Send Gil out on loan. Only paid 3 mil for him and we know he's good. Sherwood may not be playing him but thats definitely not because he's shit - I think it's because he doesn't suit the style, or didn't when we were scrapping away from relegation. It would be smart to loan him out and sell him on for profit. 

Just seen we have been cut from 20/1 to 2/1 to sign Asmir Begovic surely that's not true

My step Dad works for Coral - he says bookies do all sorts of shit to get people to bet. They love slashing odds on things they know are unlikely to come off, then they get a surge of punters betting. 

F**k that!!  Borini is average at best and we'd simply be bringing Ibe up to premiership standard for a season.

Ibe is breaking into the first team at Liverpool - he's decent. Borini though - no chance. 

I'll be absolutely shocked if that happens. 12 million and another player yeah - but I still wouldn't want that to happen. 

Willems was class for PSV last season. Got something like 12 assists as a LB. PSV have a great academy! Narsingh, PSV's right winger, looks decent too - good amount of assists and goals, he's been playing in the Dutch national side, and scored the other day for them. But obviously the prem is a massive step up - hard to say how they'd cope. 

 

He'll go Spurs if Kane goes to Man Utd or Liverpool if Sterling leaves.

If he does go we can't mess about buying loads of crud for £5 million better to spend the majority of it on a proven, prolific goal scorer. Otherwise we will be relegated.

One world class player is better than 5 average players. Just look at Livepool (Suarez) and Spurs (Bale).

Which top class would join us? We'd have to so like Southampton have done recently.

Plus if we spent all our budget on one striker snd they got injured like Benteke did, we'd more than likely be in a relegation battle. We can't be reliant on one person.

 

Agreed. Earnings have to be spread out. 3 Decent players would get us to mid table. 

 

I don't actually think he is actually worth 32.5 million and doubt he would fit in to a team that like to play a passing style. I was quite surprised to read how poor his passing accuracy is.

He is priceless for us but I would be surprised if any of the big clubs will pay that fee for him.

 

i get what your saying i dont think he is worth that much however we are in an age where players like bony cost 30m and its a case of well if bony is worth 30m then benteke is worth the same if not more.

 

Bony was a January transfer though, and it was City who came knocking (probably drove the price up)

Shlopp more like. Are we trying to guarantee a get away from relegation or flirt with it some more?

I genuinely couldn't give a monkeys about Vlaar. Weren't that bothered about him last summer given his injuries and the fact his world cup form was completely unsustainable.

Me neither. I dont think his comments were taken how he meant them though. Y'know when he said he thinks he can go a step higher? I dont think he was trying to be disrespectful to Villa, more that he has goals for himself, which is fair enough. But it's clear he wants to leave - not the arsed if he does either. 

Do people think we're gunna get a new CB and will Vlaar leave? He's not exactly been great recently Vlaar…. 

 

 

 

In Bonys defense, its kinda hard to score goals when you are a £30million benchwarmer.

 

Bony is more proven than Lukaku imo. He has done the business in 3 different leagues and internationally. Lukaku has just regressed.

yes but theres a reason why hes a £30mil benchwarmer...because he just isnt good enough for city/top4. The most bizarre 30mil that city have spent

 

No he's just not good enough to replace Aguero. 

 

sooo hes not good enough for city then is he? lols Dont really understand the point youre making.. He isnt good enough for city/top4 because they tend to have pretty elite strikers (or strikers who are good at linking up) which is making him a very expensive 30m benchwarmer and really isnt an upgrade to dzeko. He looked so out of place when he played for them

Costa > bony

Ageuro > bony

Giroud >bony

Rooney > bony

not good enough for top4 starting 11

 

Okay you go ahead and judge Bony when he's played for City 8 times - mostly as a sub. He still managed to score 2 goals and get an assist. Just because he's not as good as Aguero doesn't mean he's not good enough for City. Aguero is too good for City lol he could be in Real Madrid's first team. Although I agree he's a very expensive and unnecessary bench warmer. 

 

In Bonys defense, its kinda hard to score goals when you are a £30million benchwarmer.

 

Bony is more proven than Lukaku imo. He has done the business in 3 different leagues and internationally. Lukaku has just regressed.

yes but theres a reason why hes a £30mil benchwarmer...because he just isnt good enough for city/top4. The most bizarre 30mil that city have spent

 

No he's just not good enough to replace Aguero. 

I hope city walk away from sterling deal. I can't think of anyone we could get to replace benteke. Got a feeling he will stay to cement his place for the euros

There's plenty out there you just may not be aware of them. Who's got the time to watch 5/6 different leagues' games across Europe really? 

 

 

 

better than giroud 

He just really isnt for a side like Arsenal. For a villa side he is. But not for arsenal/most top 4

 

 

i think he is, giroud is nothing special IMO certainly not going to get them the goals to win them the league or influence games in the same way that the likes of costa / rooney / aguero can and either way arsenal expect way too much from him, they signed welbeck but he's rarely played up top, so giroud's back up is sanogo or campbell

 

benteke actually has a better scoring ratio than giroud despite the injuries and playing in a much weaker team

 

I agree. Benteke's passing at times is brilliant and I reckon he could be moulded into an Arsenal style player. Imagine Benteke with that team around him jesssssus christ.