Is Bryan Mbeumo ‘worth’ £63m? Well he is to Brentford…

Manchester United are essentially paying London pint prices when they buy from the Premier League. Plus, Newcastle worry and more.

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Duran? Duran?

Jhon Duran to Manchester United. Why isn’t this a thing?

Hakim Abdulhussein

Man Utd are paying London pint prices

I don’t disagree with the opinion that United have overpaid for players. The gripe with Glazer ownership over the last 20 years has rarely been a lack of spending but instead how poorly that money was spent. Huge sums for unsuitable and unworthy players has become part of the club’s identity.

When looking at the INEOS transfers from last season there was a marked reduction in the sums paid. For only the second time in 10 years the club spent no more than £50m on any one player, and only this sum for a highly sort young talent with good resale potential. The rest, £40m Ugarte, £38m De Ligt, £35m Zirkzee, £25m Dorgu, £13m Mazraoui, feel about right given the current market. With hindsight these may be judged as overpaying given varying degrees of success but we’ll see.

This year United have returned to the larger sums with Cunha and potentially Mbeumo both costing around £63m each. While its easy to consider this ‘same old United’ overpaying for players I see it more as a reaction to a 15th place league finish and Europa League loss. The club has to have a good season this time, and by good I mean not nearly as shit. They need to move significantly up the table to at least the European qualification positions so they need impactful low risk signing to enable this. That means buying from among the best players in the Premier League.

Like buying a pint in London signing players from other Premier League clubs just costs more. There are logical economic reasons why it costs more but it’s hard to reconcile when the sums are so large. This isn’t not a uniquely United problem though. Grealish, Nunes, Caicedo, Fofana, Lavia, Rice, Van Dijk are just some of the names that spring to mind. Arguments of overpaying aside its easy to imagine these players costing two-thirds or even half what clubs paid if they had been from the continent.

The money that has made the Premier League so strong from top to bottom also insulates smaller clubs from selling their best players. A club’s position in the league will always be more valuable to them than any one transfer fee. Brentford keeping Mbeumo might ensure they avoid relegation which could be worth hundreds of millions over the next few years. That the player has expressed his desire to move and a need to avoid asset value loss are the only reasons they are entertaining United’s interest.

Buying anything from someone who doesn’t want to sell and doesn’t particularly need to sell will always result in overpaying. Mbuemo probably isn’t worth £63m in comparison to others signed from Europe, he might have been £40m if bought from an Italian or Portuguese club, but if he meets expectations and has the immediate impact required then he probably is worth it to United. Paying more isn’t ideal but for significantly reduced risk, for a player who won’t need months to adjust to the league, I don’t think it’s unreasonable.

Dave, Manchester

Chelsea > Arsenal actually

F365 world: Arsenal are ahead of Chelsea in the football transfer food chain

Real world: Gittens rejects Arsenal for Chelsea, Andrey Santos rejects Arsenal for Chelsea move, Mudryk joins Chelsea after strong interest from Arsenal. Meanwhile, no player has ever chosen Arsenal if there was an interest from Chelsea too.

Rahul (Please rename Football365 as Arse365)

Worried about the Toon

So another transfer target drops off Newcastle’s radar. I never thought Pedro to Newcastle would be on as soon as Chelsea expressed an interest. London is a more attractive place for footballers, and Pedro is already down south, it’s a logical and understandable outcome.

What do Newcastle do now? We’re still intent on overpaying for a 22 year old GK with no Premier League experience when we’re short handed outfield. It feels like Newcastle will have to grit their teeth and get Elanga done just to avoid looking like the summer has been a complete waste of time. Guehi is going to Liverpool, we can’t compete, so we’re back to square one with a centre back target.

I think Isak will stay but maybe only one more season as the way things are shaping up we’re making a choice to leave easy for him with the lack of ambition to build a squad capable of being more than only occasional Champions League entrants, before crumbling across all fronts under the weight of games on a threadbare squad.

To be honest it does already look like the summer is a disaster for Howe and that he’s really screwed the pooch in taking the reins himself. If you insist on you and your son doing all the business and nothing gets done, maybe Mitchell had a point after all? Excellent coach and manager he may be, but we were warned that transfers were not Howe’s strength from his time at Bournemouth – this part of the job, the negotiation and finalisation of deals, should have been kept away from him.

It’s now about disaster management and trying to salvage the season before it begins. We’re not going to get first team additions in – they’ve all been taken and there’s no plan B. So we need depth to cover a very good first XI and that means warm bodies in asap.

My two cents are that we get Calvert-Lewin on a free. With his injury record he could be another crock like Wilson, but when fit he’s a good option off the bench, Howe could work some coaching magic, he’s a different option to Isak, and he has to be more reliable than Wilson who we’re trying to re-sign.

If Charlie Cresswell is keen on the mackems he’d step over his mother to play for Newcastle and has an affordable release clause which means no ‘Saudi’ tax so there is a CB sorted who can cover and also develop. Gomez from Liverpool would be a utility player who would get a lot of starts and wouldn’t cost the earth. Again, with his injury record it’s a gamble but he won’t be first choice playing 45+ games, he’ll cover for injuries across the backline and give breaks to older legs. This isn’t just recency bias based on the U21s, but Harvey Elliott can play on the right wing and the middle. He will be more expensive now but if we were willing to go to £50m each for Pedro and Elanga surely Liverpool will come to an agreement there within that scope if he’s not wanted? All that might leave some headroom for Trafford who we appear fixated on.

Those players fit the profile Howe seems to be after – young, English, and with the exception of Cresswell and Trafford, plenty of Premier League experience. I know anyone can make these transfers sound easy but if Sunderland are doing their business surely we can get something done which will save what could be a catastrophe in the making.

James, Leeds

PSR never about fairness

Been away for a while so I might be late to the party on this one.

The topic seems to be why do we bother with PSR? They say those who don’t remember history are doomed to eat peanut butter and chicken sandwiches…or something.

So let’s refresh why they were created. Originally there was no restrictions on who could own a club. It was how Magnier and the other guy bought their way to success with United. It was how Jack Walker bought his way to success with Blackburn.

We got warning signs when Leeds nearly went belly up after spending way more than they should and then failing. So the FA introduced the fit and proper test, which was a laughably easy to trick PR campaign designed to stop silly owner behaviour. But it was a few years later when that chap who bought Portsmouth for a quid waltzed past the fit and proper test and proceeded to almost bankrupt the club by not knowing what the f*** he was doing and also not having the money to cover the debts which was part of the agreement for the £1 sale.

So they ripped up the woefully inadequate fit and proper test and created a newer more strict version of it which was supposed to ensure owners actually wanted to succeed with the club and not just flip it like a meme coin rug pull.

That’s why PSR exists. It’s not for fairness, it’s not to gatekeep the top 6 or shut out the average working class Joes of…Saudi royal family. It was just to stop silly behaviour. Because there was Leeds, Liverpool, Portsmouth, Derby…and many more who flirted with bankruptcy and that looked f***ing awful for the Premier League as it essentially said their product was awful.

PSR was invented for that purpose. Somewhere along the line people got the idea it was about fairness..it never was. And more importantly absolutely nobody gave a shit about fairness for 120 years of football prior to that. Loads of teams have had their dynasties and each time it’s mostly done by buying other team’s best players.

In light of this we should all go back to realising those rules are just to stop bankruptcies and stop thinking it’s some measure of fairness which nobody seems to really want anyway.

The evidence that nobody wants it is in that everyone moans about teams spending their way to success, until it’s their team doing it.

Lee

Erasing Liverpool’s title?

I am just wondering as to the thinking behind putting next season’s table up on the website with 0 games played and zero points until a ball is kicked. Why do you not keep the table up from the season just gone instead (the one that matters right now).

You know many Reds will see it purely as rage bait. I wonder if there’s a practical reason I’m not seeing?

Dom

(It’s just a re-set when the new fixtures are announced; oddly, nobody complained this time last year – Ed)

World Cups are doomed to one hemisphere

We will all remember 20 years ago, when warnings were issued about how climate change would render future summer football tournaments completely unsuitable for the extreme heat and humidity that would be expected.

Well, it seems that moment has finally arrived. The farce of the Club World Cup being played by knackered players shuffling around a baked football pitch, played in front of stands dotted with people melting in the heat. Not to mention, the two and a half delays for weather conditions.

Give it another 10 years and the whole of the Northern Hemisphere would be unable to stage any sporting tournament, leaving the only option to hold tournaments in the Southern Hemisphere where it is their autumn/winter.

Either that or hold football tournaments in the oil-producing Gulf States which would be somehow ironically appropriate.

Ian, Halifax

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