renzo

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If Kieta is paid from next summer’s budget, and last year’s budget carries through to this year, spending £140m on VVD and Lemar seems within our means.

The only Southampton player I'm sure would improve our first XI is Shaw. At just 5'7 I have doubts about Moreno's defensive suitability.

Wouldn't a salary cap have been a better idea? Would've made it harder for the mega revenue clubs to sail off into the sunset leaving everyone else behind.

3 points from when I looked at CL tv prize money a few years ago, not sure if this still applies: The amount of tv money differs from country to country. The amount of tv money a club receives is heavily dependent on league placing to qualify. The first placed team gets a lot more than what a 4th placed team gets (from memory possibly double). The pot of tv money for each country is divided between the teams left in the competition. So if it's just us in the quarters, we'd get all the money. But if 4 English teams are in the quarters, the tv money gets divided between the 4 according to league position the previous season.

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Concerned a Papa-Agger axis is short of air power.

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Presumably he would earn more from ancilliaries like marketing, publicity, etc. playing in the Premier League than Turkey.

Assuming the £7m for Aquilani went straight into his pocket, if LFCHistory is accurate, this will be the least we’ve received from sales since 1998-99 when the sales of Ruddock, Harkness and McAteer pulled in £5m. Seems a lifetime away. Even £15m in sales would have made a world of difference to the outcomes from the season. It was a major impediment and perhaps we should have recalibrated our targets in the last few weeks when it was clear clubs weren’t beating down gates to buy our players and they in turn weren’t easily going to be extracted from their contracts.

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f*** sakes Mao, don't lump me in with Bailo! Don't even think I'm being that controversial here.

I'm not digging! Just think there might be better ways of going about these games. And I'd go further, sometimes March and April can be quite empty for fixtures if we're out of cups, I'd throw a freindly in there too.

See, that was a much better response and a fair point. I suppose what I'd do differently is sacrifice the last pre-season game, which is usually at home, for something abroad.

Too quick to snipe! I'd mentioned earlier that I'm speaking generally. It's obvious the qualifiers were an issue this summer!

Disagree. It goes without saying that preparing players for the season is important, but all our competitors are overseas as well so we're not at any major disadvantage. Commercial revenues will be vital to keeping us at the higher end of the table whilst we flounder on the new stadium. It's ultimately the key factor that prevents us from having Newcastle like revenues. It may not be the traditional way of doing things, or the best way to obtain optimum fitness, but these overseas games are important in expanding the fanbase and I think it would make for a better spectacle if we did things differently.

Yes but generally these overseas ventures are always at the start of pre-season. If we're trying to show the club in its best light, staging them when the 'stars' are available and performing better makes more sense. Foreign revenues are going to be increasingly important and it just strikes me as odd that we put so much effort into publicising these games and then use players who'll barely get a game in the season. We should be putting on more of a show.

Surely it makes more sense to schedule these showcase friendlies towards the end of pre-season. If the idea is to market the club to new fans and give existing fans a chance to see their team, then having early friendlies when it's just kids and second rate players fresh and unfit off their hols delivering a snoozefest isn't exactly the best way of wheeling punters in. They should schedule them towards the end of pre-season when the better players are available, maybe there's 1 or 2 exciting new signings and better fitness levels deliver a much better spectacle. Sure I get that might cause jetlag issues ahead of the season, but if we're back a week/10 days beforehand it shouldn't be that significant.

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I remember reading an article in some US publication around the time of the takeover where Henry makes a specific mention of buying British players. At the time I thought it was a strange comment for someone unfamiliar with the European football to make and it had me sufficiently worried. Wish I could find the article now, but here's Comolli speaking about a preference for Brits early in his tenure: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/liverpool/8136085/Liverpools-future-lies-in-development-of-home-grown-talent-says-Damien-Comolli.html It seems to me the policy must have been instituted by the owners or else why hire Comolli and give him that brief? I do think there's some merit in the strategy mind. Since the influx of foreigners, the league champions over the last 20 years have almost all had a core of at least 3+ Brits in the team, so there's historic reason to it. But those players would have to be among the very best the country has to offer. Ours on the other hand are from the second or third string, on the fringes of the national team. If we couldn't secure the best, then forcing Downing, Adam, etc down our throats wasn't the best idea. I'd put the last summer and Carroll as amongst the worst transfer periods in the clubs history, up there with the summers following the treble and Istanbul, in terms of blowing a tremendous opportunity to make significant progress. Culpability for that lies with the owners, Comolli and Kenny. The situation is not all lost, the club even without the CL generates excess cash to fund another spending round like last summer, it's just that we'll be in yet another year of 'rebuilding'.

I'd reduce Fletches 'wages saved' to £600k a week on account of our contribution to Cole's wages and a payoff to Degen. I'd guess the wagebill of the new signings would look something like this: Adam - 60 Henderson - 60 Downing - 80 Enrique – 65 Doni - 30 Coates - 40 Bellamy - 100 Carroll - 80 Suarez - 80 Total: £595k a week. The net effect being the wagebill is about the same but the squad's been improved.