It’s been a long old week of net spend chat and ‘This Means More’ self-love so we have banned net spend from this Mailbox.
Instead we concentrate on absolutely everything else happening in football, including some stern criticism of F365. We take it on the chin.
Send your thoughts to theeditor@footbal365.com
Mistakes we all make with England
The international break is here, and the mighty Andorra stand in England’s way. Here are five mistakes we all make with the national team and its fixtures:
So beating Andorra 2-0 tomorrow will not mean that England should be booed off the pitch, will not imply that we’re going to win the World Cup, and will not confirm that Ruben Loftus-Cheek is the answer. Will we ever learn?
Paul in Brussels
Glasner blame for Guehi situation is scant
In reply to DF, I haven’t absolved Oliver Glasner of all blame for his part in the Marc Guéhi saga. However, he is certainly less culpable for the mess than other parties.
In part, this is because of the way Crystal Palace work when it comes to transfers. They’ve never been a club to throw lots of money behind signing any and all players the manager has taken a shine to. Readers with long memories will recall that part of what motivated Tony Pulis to leave the club was that he couldn’t persuade Steve Parish to break the transfer record and wage structure for Steven N’Zonzi – a good Premier League player, but not record signing good.
One of the things I like about Palace is that compared to other teams, they do a lot of their business in private instead of through the media. That’s why, for example, a lot of the Guéhi coverage was “Liverpool believe etc” with little by way of direct quote from Palace. The downside to this is that it does seem like not much is happening about transfers most of the time – at least if you’re like one of the team leaders in my department, who doesn’t believe their staff are actually working unless they can see them doing something.
All of this means that we can only speculate as to what actually happened, but my best theory is this: the backroom team will have identified several potential centre-back signings, some will be players who can be developed to fit Glasner’s system, and some will be players who could immediately replace Guéhi. The first category is easier to sign, typically by overpaying on their current value as a speculation as to their development. The second is a lot harder: you’re signing another team’s best player and they want as much money as they can from you, especially as they’ll know you’re about to receive a windfall from a big sale yourself. So negotiating a good deal is more complicated than it might be.
It all creates a difficult situation. I still believe that the board and Glasner were both acting in what they thought was the club’s best interests, even though they appear to be in conflict here. As I said before, there are fences to mend but I don’t think the damage is irreparable.
Ed Quoththeraven
Taking umbrage with F365 about Guehi
I’m a long time reader of F365. I’ve been so because I largely think the content is well balanced, intelligent, interesting and unbiased. Obviously, there are pieces that are not of the highest quality, perhaps a little click-baitey but I understand F365 is a business, and the reality is you need to balance high quality journalistic content with driving traffic through your site, and those catchy headlines sure do draw people in.
However, Sam Cooper’s piece condensed into a single article everything that is wrong with the site so concisely (whilst also adding a few novel aspects himself) I could not help but take the opportunity to air all of my grievances in one go by critiquing this single horrific article.
Lets start with the headline – Four massive reasons its hard to have sympathy for ‘extremely unhappy’ Marc Guehi.
Massive reasons huh? Blimey. This is going to be good. Massive reasons must be something extremely significant because otherwise why would you use that particular adjective in your headline? It certainly wouldn’t be for click-bait reasons because you guys hate click-bait.
Also, can we start by having a quick wonder at the whole premise for the article. Marc Gehi is a man F365 itself has held up as a bastion of professionalism in a quagmire of entitled, selfish, power hungry players downing tools. Yet when, through no fault of his own, the examination bed gets pulled out from under him at the last minute, Sam Cooper decides this might be an opportunity to dig deeper into the situation and see if he could come up with some reasons, contrary to the obvious ones of acting professionally, loyally and extremely competently during his entire career at Crystal Palace, up to and including this pre-season/first games of the season when there was transfer talk, that Marc Guehi might not deserve the very obvious sympathy of the general football public?
There is no lack of dick footballers Sam, but you went for the 25-year-old who still lives at home with his parents and sisters, all round seemingly good egg Marc Guehi, as your target for an old-fashioned hatchet job? But wait, I forgot, these are MASSIVE reasons, once we hear these bombshells everything will come into focus for sure…
And hear we do, but first is a bit of guff about Steve Parish doing a fitness class on the evening of deadline day. How this relates to Marc’s transfer falling apart is not explained and certainly seems unconnected to said ‘massive reasons’ but does give an opportunity for Sam to make a funny about a man doing fitness.
But when Sam does get round to dropping that first massive bombshell, it’s a doozy. The favourite gripe of every proper football fan. Money. How has the greedy footballer attempted to swindle the hardworking club owner out of his vault of cash this time, Sam? Well, by being allowed to have a large signing on fee when he leaves in a year’s time, of course. Something Sam points out as being ‘increasingly attractive’ to players who would rather receive the money otherwise allocated to a transfer fee themselves.
Apart from this whole article being about Marc Guehi trying to get his dream transfer and it breaking down, so clearly Marc isn’t that bothered about a large signing on fee, the un-greedy bastard. But wait there’s more, Marc ‘wouldn’t get a massive €150m signing on fee like Mbappe anyway, but wherever he does go he will certainly get more than the £50k a week he currently gets.’ And will continue to get for another year right, Sam. Because his move broke down.
Whereas if he went to Liverpool, the reigning Premiership champions, as a full England international, he would probably be due a fairly ‘massive’ pay rise. But he didn’t get that because his move fell through. But we shouldn’t feel sorry for him because in a years time he will get that pay rise that he isn’t getting now. Gotcha.
And there’s more, ‘Liverpool were leading the charge for Guehi this summer and seemed the only ones willing to get close to Palace’s £35m asking fee.’ Where to start with this nonsense… First off, I absolutely guarantee you Crystal Palace didn’t set his fee at £35m. They would have been asking for a minimum of £50m this summer. And do you actually believe there was only 1 club willing to pay £35m for Marc Guehi? The current best English CB? With the current premium for English players + the premium for Premiership proven quality? £35m? Really? And you’re a football journalist?
The sole reason Liverpool held firm with their valuation of £35m is because Marc Guehi would only go to 1 club – Liverpool. It’s already been reported numerous times, Newcastle and Spurs bids of £60m+ in the January transfer window were not turned down by Palace but by Guehi. Liverpool weren’t willing to spend that kind of cash on someone with only 18 months on his contract, but made it clear they would be in for him in the summer when they knew his preference for only Liverpool would allow them to drive a hard bargain, particularly with Palace desperate to avoid him leaving for free in a further 12 months.
With this being the case the rest of this ‘reason’ is moribund. He doesn’t need to wait for 12 months to see which other clubs come sniffing around because every club who doesn’t already have 2 starting world class defenders would have been interested this summer. He was an absolute bargain. There will be the same gathering of elite clubs this winter and next summer, and assuming Liverpool don’t fall off a cliff, he will go there in either of the upcoming windows just as he wanted to in this one.
Next massive reason it seems is ‘world cup year’ which does funny things to players minds, and journalists ones too if this article is anything to go by. This at least has a logical premise. Yes, he would likely start every game for Crystal Palace, whereas there is certainly much more competition with Konate and VVD at Liverpool. However, being a world cup year there is also an argument that Palace being in Europe and Guehi being a guaranteed starter, there could be a little too much playing time for Guehi, particularly if Palace end up doing well in cup competitions as they have done recently.
As one of the 3 elite centre backs in a squad containing 5 in total he would be afforded proper rotation with Liverpool, and as they are likely to have as many as 60 games, they can offer him ample playing time with opportunity to stop any individual from being burdened with excessive minutes.
Finally, and frankly most egregiously, we come to Sam’s last, and F365’s most favourite bugbear, morality. ‘How much sympathy can you have for a man who has little sympathy for one of society’s most marginalised groups.’ Oh Jebus, what’s he gone and said? He’s refused to take the knee, has he? Been caught with years old social media comments slating jews or women or gay people? I know its got to be something pretty outrageous to be a massive reason not to have sympathy for him…
Oh. He wrote ‘I love Jesus’ and ‘Jesus loves you’ on his rainbow armband that he didn’t refuse to wear. Deeply religious, son of a pastor Marc, wrote he loves Jesus. I see now, Sam. Burn him. Burn him at the stake.
If this isn’t the definition of Helen Lovejoy clasping her pearls and screaming “Won’t someone please think of the children” I don’t know what is. First off, I understand you want to promote inclusivity and equality on your site. I agree with you. I think it is a noble endeavour. I have a gender fluid family member who is gay. They are a wonderful, wonderful person who I am honoured to know. But that doesn’t mean I think it reasonable, and they certainly wouldn’t, to start shaming anyone who battles with the complex snake pit of balancing deeply held religious beliefs with promoting societal inclusivity.
Frankly Sam, who the fuck are you to state with appalling moral righteousness, where conclusively the line is drawn between contrasting protected characteristics? Let alone that once designating a football player you don’t know as to be on the wrong side of that line, that we should all remove any semblance of sympathy for this most despicable character when something unfortunate should happen to them. Its virtue signalling based on ‘massively’ bullshit reasoning.
Do yourself a favour, buddy. Get off your giant high horse, grab the F365 crew and take a long hard look in the mirror and ask yourselves whether you are pure enough of character, in action and intention, to justify the frequent demonisation of people you have moral disagreement with. If not, try what many other people do – promote what you believe to be the best opinions and actions, constructively critique and communicate with those who you disagree with, and act first with kindness not coldness.
Ed Ern
Not having the Levy love-in
Nope, sorry, I’m not having the Levy love. You know what you’re doing 365 you little buggers, you’ve put the bait out. So let’s go…
You can’t be REALLY good at 2 parts of your job, when you need to be good at the necessary 7 or 8 parts.
What was he good at? Fiscal responsibility and land management. And my goodness, he was the best at those things.
What was he bad at?
Forming partnerships with the right people. He was horrific at it. Any success he had with a manager was down to luck. He got it wrong time and again and then hid with his cronies rather than front up to an inability to form the type of relationship that Dein and Wenger or Ferguson and Edwards had.
Communication. He simply didn’t do it.
Negotiation. For a supposedly shrewd negotiator he got his pants pulled down every time Spurs spent big. Lo Celso and Dembele? And messed up countless other deals.
Opportunity spotting. He let the squad stagnate under Poch. We fluked our way to the Champions League final and once there showed we didn’t have the squad to compete with a lackluster Liverpool. A little bit of speculating would surely have accumulated more
Timing. How on earth do you sack Mourinho days before a cup final?
I’m actually going to miss that bald head and snakey eyes but he’s no success. He rode the wave of a sleeping giant on the up against a backdrop of a Premier League boom domestically and internationally. Big love to all the letters from overseas that you printed showing Levy support. But for those of us who’ve had their hearts broken at countless cup finals over the last 25 years, this is for you.
Andrew, Woodford Green
READ: Five reasons we should all be scared of a post-Daniel Levy Tottenham
Would neutrals take a Daniel Levy?
As an armchair Tottenham supporter and entrepreneur, I have a lot of respect and sympathy for Daniel Levy.
He had to take the fall with all the supporter feedback he’s been getting over the years – but he has improved the club in so many ways that he deserves a lot of recognition.
Here’s a question to supporters of any club that has not won a trophy in the past 25 odd years – would you take a Daniel Levy over your current ownership?
Tom Joe
What do Spurs look like without Levy?
I tried to imagine the parallel universe in which the sliding doors moment of Daniel Levy coming in as Spurs’ Head Honcho never happens.
After some time I concluded that in this parallel universe, Spurs could very well have won the league at least once and maybe twice (investing ON the pitch at the right times rather than keeping powder dry as Levy was so often criticised for doing). I also concluded that there was just as much likelihood that in that same 25 years, Spurs would have been relegated as many times as they lifted major pots and that the club would find itself, today, with an entirely dysfunctional squad, amoral ownership and still playing in a dilapidated, 100-year-old stadium (like a couple of other members of the “Big 6/7”).
The worst bit is, I genuinely don’t know which universe I’d prefer to live in.
Chris Bridgeman, Kingston upon Thames
Gyokeres the real winner of the transfer window
In Response to “Football is a Sport filled with hypocrites”, I agree with everything said but it heightens my belief that the real winner of how the transfer window ended was Viktor Gyokeres.
All the noise around Isak and Wissa, Chelsea signing Buonette who finally fulfilled his dream of Champions League football, only for it to last less than 48 hours as he wasn’t registered, numerous utd players being left to rot if they didn’t move, and the list could go on… no one seems to mention or even remember that it was only a few short months ago that Gyokeres went on strike, said he would never play for the club, told everyone he had a gentleman’s agreement and Lisbon had gone back on it. Literally, beat for beat, the same as what Isak has done, the only difference being that Sporting decided early doors that the issue could not be resolved, got rid and gave themselves plenty of time to re invest.
Newcastle decided on the other route of letting it drag out till there is little or no time to buy anyone of proven quality, leave it till the last day when all the top available players have been sold, and overpay on potential and someone with one good season (that I do not think he will be able to replicate). It’s a bold strategy, let’s see how that works out for them Cotton.
So Viktor, if you’re reading (sure its international break, nothing else to do really), If I was you I’d be building a shrine to Isak, wissa and the rest of the lads cause you seem to escaped the scrutiny and vitriol so beautifully, that its like you have got hold of the memory wipe pen from Men in Black.
Sullivan Out.
Hammer McHammerface
Stop behaving like children, men of the Forest
I know that football is a different world to the average office, but reports that Nuno and Edu are no longer on speaking terms is actually shocking.
Maybe it is being overplayed and they merely only speak in purely professional terms, but if it is true that they are actually not speaking…
What other billion pound business would have two senior figures refusing to speak to each other, like children on a playground!? Surely that is reasons for sacking at least one of gross negligence? I know that is a fantasy outcome, but it rally does reflect badly on both of them.
I have no skin in the game, and given the circus that my club has been for over a decade am hardly in a position to criticise, but surely this must be infuriating to Forest fans?
Jack (Having never seen him play, I can confidently state, like some social media accounts, that Lammens is the answer to all our problems) Manchester
Sympathy for Emi Martinez
So, kind of in reference to Will Ford’s article (are they called articles?) on Sept 1st about Emi Martinez being a dickhead…I feel like this is a little unfair.
Martinez is a dickhead on the pitch, totally correct there, but I feel like he’s being unfairly labelled about this whole saga with Man Yanited.
We’ve had various reports stating that Martinez was “pushing for the move” and “speaking to Yanited since January” and this instantly gets taken as Martinez trying to engineer a move out of Villa Park, I don’t think that’s totally correct. It’s also been reported that many of Villa’s top earners were available at the right price to help the club with it’s PSR woes (don’t start me on PSR), of which Martinez is one of.
I think it’s highly likely that Martinez was told that he would be sold if the right offer came in. Martinez has never shown a desire to leave Villa before, he’s always been (outwardly) happy and Man Yanited aren’t currently the force they were…he’s also handsomely paid already at Villa, to the point that his wages are apparently what caused the change of heart in the sale.
Martinez backs himself because he’s a cocky dickhead, even after what I’d call a poor, error strewn season last year, so he’d assumed someone would be interested, especially if his agent started offering him about…and with his new agent, that’s highly likely. At this point, Martinez has two options, to wait and see who bids OR he engineers a move that suits him and his family. Man Yanited would suit him, he could feasible still live in the posh area he currently lives in, his kids can still go to the same schools, his wife’s businesses aren’t affected and he can still get to training within 90+ minutes. So that would surely be the move you wanted to make if you HAD to.
Martinez has always been a great servant to the club* and knowing how his sale would benefit the club, it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that he would want to help facilitate this move for that reason (and the fact he’d get a longer contract, maybe more money).
So, a lot of the hate towards Martinez may be totally uncalled for and the club won’t say anything about what went on. Martinez is too professional to comment in a way that would damage the club’s reputation, so we’ll just keep assuming Martinez was the dickhead.
