Transfer Rumours | Tactics | Who to buy/sell etc

Barcelona offered a world record bid for Rabiot? When?

we made a first approach for neymar when he was at santos, we had first dibs on him, but for a multitude of reason somewhere along the line it stalled. at the time the conclusion by some was he was told he'd have to come off the bench, others speculated flo didn't like negotiations with his dad, some speculated it was santos; who where en route to winning the clibertatdores. we never got a clear answer on what happened with that; the main speculation was money or playing time (neymar wasn't considered established by critics in europe at the time)

the following year, santos had the club world cup match with barcelona and that imo was when barcelona stepped in and heightened negotiations. barca have been interested in rabiot, even they have stated officially that they've spoken with psg about him (i don't know about the record transfer part), but as of summer 2018, they definitely spoke to psg about him

and we know what happened to verratti and silva (who practically begged to go there lol), tbh i like psg, just because they don't have the same history doesn't mean they'll let folks push them around.

i especially liked how they handled the verratti situation. a boss move , don't sell him, make him go on tv and apologize, then pay neymar's release fee in the process, even though barca didn't want to sell

I should have wrote, there is no factual data that said we tried to sign Neymar from PSG and not from Santos. Of course, I totally believe we did and still doing but that's just my own belief based on rumours and simply how Madrid operates.

Honestly, anyone who believes that Madrid tried to sign Neymar and Mbappé after they signed for PSG is either insulting their own intelligence or they don't have one to begin with.

They are not coming. They follow the trail of money, the same trail that dried up years ago when Florentino decided to pull the plugs on his own ambitions.

The Demon of Carthage wrote:Honestly, anyone who believes that Madrid tried to sign Neymar and Mbappé after they signed for PSG is either insulting their own intelligence or they don't have one to begin with.

They are not coming. They follow the trail of money, the same trail that dried up years ago when Florentino decided to pull the plugs on his own ambitions.

love how you think that Perez who has been in love with madrid since he was a boy and grew up idolizing Di Stefano, no longer has any ambitions to see Madrid win and prosper, i assume compared to you right? i guess posting on an internet forum is the highest point of club fandom nowadays

I could only imagine how DoC was when Madrid went trophy-less for 3 years.

Doc wrote:Barcelona offered a world record bid for Rabiot? When?

In terms of wages with Rabiot, not fees.  In terms of purchase fees, Silva, Verratti and Marquinhos...  PSG was offered the highest fees ever for their respective positions at the time by Barca (Pogba type money for Verratti at the time).  They've been trying to get Rabiot for free going on 3 years now.  3 years ago, they offered him a 15 mil signing bonus and a massive wage to let his contract run out. He extended for 2 years at PSG because he wanted to go the World Cup.  Same thing this past summer.  

Rabiot is letting his contract run out this time.  Problem is that EPL is offering even bigger wages than Barca is.  

What are we talking about?  More than the highest paid CM ever on Barca which happen to be Sergio Busquets.  He's looking to make 10 mil net a season + 25 mil signing bonus since he's coming on a free.  Barca's willing to pay...  but there's a bidding war.  So we'll see where he goes.

when did Barca offer 114 millions for Verratti ? i demand proofs please, and serious ones

the "record" offer to sign Rabiot was spinned to an record offer for wages; i dont even know which record a 10 mil salary breaks? is he the first tall white french player with long hair and a mom as an agent to receive such offer? if that's a category then i guess it's a record.

let's see how you spin this one

https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/transfers/marco-verratti-psg-paris-saint-germain-barcelona-transfer-news-neymar-mbappe-a8012551.html

It's linked to a l'Equipe article that interviewed him at the time.  This is the English version.

You're firing as accurately as your countryman Choupo-Moting lately....

ayummm
1) in that interview Verratti is not saying barca specifically wanted him, it's conjecture from the article
2) he said he stayed at psg because they are wonderful
3) this is a direct contradiction to your initial argument

Sportsczy wrote:IF the money was equal, players would come to Madrid.  But the money isn't equal...  and players go for money.

It's all about money.  Only reason players used to all come to Madrid was because of the money.  R9, Zidane, RVN, CR, Benzema, Kaka, etc all came here because we paid the most.  End of.

Verratti wrote:“People think that I play for PSG for the money, but I could get that elsewhere, too. If I had moved in the summer, there were clubs ready to pay €100m to sign me and I would have earned a lot more.

UFF

i must say, as a madrid fan and a marseille fan, you sure like to blow hot air up psg arse

R u effin serious?  R u telling me that as someone who not only follows Ligue 1, but more specifically PSG, you did not pay attention to the whole Verratti saga in 2016 and 2017?

Verratti literally had signed a new contract running through 2021 a few months before the saga where Barca went after him with the 100+ mil offer (we know it was Barca; don't be such a disingenuous shit).  His agent went to the media and said "Verratti wants to move to Barca" and Verratti backed him up by not denying it for months.  But once he realized that he had another 4 years left on his contract and a) PSG wasn't going to sell him and also b) he wasn't going to get more money by acting this way...  he backed off.  

In fact, PSG pretty much forced Verratti to fire his agent (he did), publicly apologize (he did) and keep his mouth shut unless it's positive (he has).  PSG told him and his agent that they'd rather let him rot on the bench than to sell him to Barca (same thing is happening with Rabiot btw).

Here's Verratti's agent talking about it prior to getting fired:  https://www.marca.com/en/football/barcelona/2017/07/07/595f5061268e3ecb6d8b4655.html

And here's more news coverage
https://www.sofascore.com/news/marco-verratti-fires-agent-hires-raiola/

So really...  get your head out of your ass.

Verratti wanted to go for the cash but he had no leverage.  Same thing with Silva and Marquinhos.  They all came to PSG for the money in the first place and have stayed for the exact same reason.  In fact, with his contract running out in 2021, PSG have offered Verratti a massive contract of 210k per week just recently per media...  now he has leverage.  And guess what, he's using it get as much money as he can.  If someone else wants to pay him as much or more than PSG, I'm sure he'd go there too.  Raiola is representing him so you can count on it in fact.

Jose Luis Sanchez: Varane has told he club he would like to leave this summer

Mr Nick09 wrote:Jose Luis Sanchez: Varane has told he club he would like to leave this summer

I know there is no April Fools in Spain but I'm gonna assume there is some truth to it. In any case, whoever wants Varane should be forced to take Bale as well.

He must be unhappy with his current contract and pressuring the club into giving him a better one.

If Florentino wants to hold on to his players, he has to pay them as handsomely as the other big clubs, otherwise they'll go somewhere else. Money always talks and that's the only thing players are looking for.

Varane is apparently earning close to 5m per year. Can someone check if this is legit? Cause if so, I can name at least 5 clubs who would be willing to offer him more than that.

Ok, Varane is definitely underpaid, uff.

There you go. It might be the reason why he wants out (assuming the rumors of him wanting out are legit).

His agent sucks a negotiating new deals lol, he should fire his agent and hire Raiola. he is going to earn a huge contract he goes goes to United for example

I know the Werner ship has probably sailed, and I have already pledged my allegiance to the Jovic train, but Werner isn't the worst alternative to Jovic.

Just 23. 1 year left on his contract. RB would love to sell him to a non-Bayern club. About a goal every other game, better goalscoring record in europe than in the league. That is the pitch.

Honestly I would still prefer to put my money on Jovic, but Werner is a player that I think people have somewhat forgotten about (wrongfully) because he had a bad WC. No one seems to really be in for him apart from Liverpool and Bayern so we could potentially get him for a steal.

@ Deez, thinking about the fact that Varane might go, would you like to see De Ligt in his place. i have hard time figuring out his level too much overhype. The model CB right now is Van Dijk, probably the best this season. How far away is De ligt from that lvel?

The Jovic train lol. I'm just gonna take your guys insight on him because I really see no reason to watch Frankfurt matches. Also, my heart still says Icardi...

I'd kill for De Ligt. He's the real deal. He'd also get more playing time here than at Barca, but seems like he's really set on becoming a Barca player.

If we have the chance we need to pounce.

It's a tough question, because in terms of current level De Ligt looks great for the national team, but then of course VvD is there and VvD can make Lovren and Matip look like soild defenders. And De Ligt has been great for Ajax, but I really don't know how he would do outside of the system he is currently in, especially if a club like RM would throw him into the deep end cleaning up Ramos' errors.

I'm not going to say De Ligt is overrated, but he is a bit overhyped, like he is still a kid let's remember. The perfect situation would have been to sign him instead of Militao and have him take over for Ramos- not Varane.

To replace Varane I think we should go for a different profile of player. Someone more established and ready to take on the ridiculous amounts of criticism he will get here. I don't think De Ligt is there yet. Players that might not have the ceiling of De Ligt, but players like: Alderweireld (contract ending), Umtiti (unhappy with Barca supposedly), Skriniar, or Laporte (if we can undo his agreement with Bayern).

But to talk about De Ligt, I think he has everything in his locker to become one of the best CBs and I would love to have him, but for the sake of the national team I would prefer him to go to a less volatile club or at least a situation where he can ease into a starting spot without so much pressure.

It seems to me that De Ligt is not looking for a club where he is going to be 3rd CB, and the situation at barcelona is not clear for him...there is Umtiti and even Lenglet has been doing well.

I would agree that a more mature centerback like Koulibaly would be perfect. But it's a deal with many obstacle, which is why i was asking about De Ligt