Jadon Sancho

[Cityfan]

Thanks Lancs Blue. I was hoping that Sanchonead under contract like one of the earlier posters said. I don't think Chelski got a great deal for Solanke so I guess any compensation will be in the single digit millions.

I don't think the Solanke compensation figure has been fixed yet.

 

[Hamsterdam95]

The only way to stop players leaving having an effect is to promote someone.

Kids in our academy won't give a shit about Ty Campbell playing for Stoke if Foden or Brahim are first teamers for us.

I still think the underlying issue is everyone can see the club has no faith in youth players and they keep buying which blocks the academy player. I'll give three key examples:

1) Kelechi had a fantastic breakthrough season, was being quoted as a top talent from around the world. Before his second season starts, we buy his replacement. That's a huge subset of the problem, for example, Gabriel Jesus is better than Kelechi and Rashford, but United put faith in Rashford and didn't go buy a wonderkid. Rashford was atrocious for the first half of the season, but Mourinho kept faith and kept playing him, and then he turned it on the second half of the season. We didn't even plan to give Kelechi a fair shot at a second season.

2) Pablo Maffeo, he had a perfect opportunity to be second choice. Yet we bought a second RB for a large sum. We weren't even willing to take a chance. Take Arsene and Bellerin for example, he was given a opportunity to be second choice which allowed him to push for the first team spot.

3) Jason Denayer, he was magnificent in his first year on loan, as good as someone can be for their first time on loan. You could see his talent and how comfortable he was on the ball. Yet we panicked a couple of days before the market closed and bought Otamendi for massive fee at that time.

What these 3 examples show me is that Txixi/Pep/Whoever is making decisions has always made the easy decision. Buy the tested and tried player who has performed at the highest level. Right now, the clubs impression is that of a club which just buys whoever looks promising. Mbappe had a fantastic season, let's bid for him. Dembele looks a potential world class player, lets put him on a radar. All that is fine, but we already have so many promising players on our books. If we were like RM, where CR7, Bale and Benzema are in their prime and they have no young promising attackers on their books (Ascensio is a CAM), moving for Mbappe makes sense. When we do it, it just signals to the outside world, the club doesn't think Sane, Sterling, Jesus and B. Silva are enough, they need Mbappe and Dembele aswell. We have already made significant investments in young talent, when we are in the media placing bids for more young talent, all the young talent in the academy will run away. Can't really blame anyone who is young for leaving because by the time they approach the age when they are ready to be involved in the first team, good knows how many players we will buy. The solution is to keep a small squad and have a clear pathway to the first team.

 

[domalino]

I still think the underlying issue is everyone can see the club has no faith in youth players and they keep buying which blocks the academy player. I'll give three key examples:

1) Kelechi had a fantastic breakthrough season, was being quoted as a top talent from around the world. Before his second season starts, we buy his replacement. That's a huge subset of the problem, for example, Gabriel Jesus is better than Kelechi and Rashford, but United put faith in Rashford and didn't go buy a wonderkid. Rashford was atrocious for the first half of the season, but Mourinho kept faith and kept playing him, and then he turned it on the second half of the season. We didn't even plan to give Kelechi a fair shot at a second season.

2) Pablo Maffeo, he had a perfect opportunity to be second choice. Yet we bought a second RB for a large sum. We weren't even willing to take a chance. Take Arsene and Bellerin for example, he was given a opportunity to be second choice which allowed him to push for the first team spot.

3) Jason Denayer, he was magnificent in his first year on loan, as good as someone can be for their first time on loan. You could see his talent and how comfortable he was on the ball. Yet we panicked a couple of days before the market closed and bought Otamendi for massive fee at that time.

What these 3 examples show me is that Txixi/Pep/Whoever is making decisions has always made the easy decision. Buy the tested and tried player who has performed at the highest level. Right now, the clubs impression is that of a club which just buys whoever looks promising. Mbappe had a fantastic season, let's bid for him. Dembele looks a potential world class player, lets put him on a radar. All that is fine, but we already have so many promising players on our books. If we were like RM, where CR7, Bale and Benzema are in their prime and they have no young promising attackers on their books (Ascensio is a CAM), moving for Mbappe makes sense. When we do it, it just signals to the outside world, the club doesn't think Sane, Sterling, Jesus and B. Silva are enough, they need Mbappe and Dembele aswell. We have already made significant investments in young talent, when we are in the media placing bids for more young talent, all the young talent in the academy will run away. Can't really blame anyone who is young for leaving because by the time they approach the age when they are ready to be involved in the first team, good knows how many players we will buy. The solution is to keep a small squad and have a clear pathway to the first team.

All three of those examples are bad, yet again, you're relying on your selective memory to push your point, which is particularly odd here because you seem to be trying to agree with me.

Example 1 is obviously bullshit though because Kelechi wasn't playing before Jesus arrived, and didn't play in the 4 months that he was injured. It wasn't Gabriel Jesus that curtailed his City career. As for United...they bought Ibrahimovic, pushing Rashford onto the wing where he was shit for 8 months, and now they've bought Lukaku for £90m. Tell us more about how United put their faith in Rashford?

Example 2 is simply wrong, because what we did was buy 1 player to cover RB & LB, and CM. He doesn't block Maffeo any more than Bertrand would have, who we were planning on getting before Alves pulled out. If Pep thought Maffeo was good enough, he'd just make Danilo LB/CM cover.

So is 3, as we bought Otamendi thinking Demichelis and/or Mangala would go, when they signed that deal they expected Denayer to stay and play. You can blame them for fucking that situation up by loaning Denyaer, but you can't pretend their intention was to get Otamendi instead of Denayer because it's demonstrably not true.


As for your Real Madrid point, Asensio is most definitely an attacker, he's a winger. That's where he played for Espanyol, it's where he plays for Real and where he plays for Spain's u21. He does not compete with Kroos, Madric, Kovacic or Ceballos for game time, he competes with Bale, Benzema and Ronaldo. Yes he could play #10 but there's no #10 role at Madrid.

So your point about moving for Mbappé making sense because Asensio's not a forward falls flat on it's face, but criticising the club for being interested in the best players in the world, along with Real, Barcelona, PSG and anyone else who can afford them was always a bad point to try and make anyway.

 

[Hamsterdam95]

All three of those examples are bad, yet again, you're relying on your selective memory to push your point, which is particularly odd here because you seem to be trying to agree with me.

Example 1 is obviously bullshit though because Kelechi wasn't playing before Jesus arrived, and didn't play in the 4 months that he was injured. It wasn't Gabriel Jesus that curtailed his City career. As for United...they bought Ibrahimovic, pushing Rashford onto the wing where he was shit for 8 months, and now they've bought Lukaku for £90m. Tell us more about how United put their faith in Rashford?

Example 2 is simply wrong, because what we did was buy 1 player to cover RB & LB, and CM. He doesn't block Maffeo any more than Bertrand would have, who we were planning on getting before Alves pulled out. If Pep thought Maffeo was good enough, he'd just make Danilo LB/CM cover.

So is 3, as we bought Otamendi thinking Demichelis and/or Mangala would go, when they signed that deal they expected Denayer to stay and play. You can blame them for fucking that situation up by loaning Denyaer, but you can't pretend their intention was to get Otamendi instead of Denayer because it's demonstrably not true.


As for your Real Madrid point, Asensio is most definitely an attacker, he's a winger. That's where he played for Espanyol, it's where he plays for Real and where he plays for Spain's u21. He does not compete with Kroos, Madric, Kovacic or Ceballos for game time, he competes with Bale, Benzema and Ronaldo. Yes he could play #10 but there's no #10 role at Madrid.

So your point about moving for Mbappé making sense because Asensio's not a forward falls flat on it's face, but criticising the club for being interested in the best players in the world, along with Real, Barcelona, PSG and anyone else who can afford them was always a bad point to try and make anyway.

I'm not going to argue semantics over your interpretation of my argument with you. Your whole point of no one will care about Campbell if Foden/Brahim feature is a correct but it is not the underlying problem. My whole point is the underlying problem that we have always chosen the easy option which is to buy a player which is tried and tested rather than have faith in a youngster. Until that changes, I can't see much changing. If Brahim or Foden impress this year, and we don't buy another player in their position next year, then sure my viewpoint will change. They key point being is our spending and transfers are main drivers of how much academy players will be involved, not giving Brahim/Foden some minutes.

 

[domalino]

I'm not going to argue semantics over your interpretation of my argument with you. Your whole point of no one will care about Campbell if Foden/Brahim feature is a correct but it is not the underlying problem. My whole point is the underlying problem that we have always chosen the easy option which is to buy a player which is tried and tested rather than have faith in a youngster. Until that changes, I can't see much changing. If Brahim or Foden impress this year, and we don't buy another player in their position next year, then sure my viewpoint will change. They key point being is our spending and transfers are main drivers of how much academy players will be involved, not giving Brahim/Foden some minutes.

Your argument is literally nonsense though. You're arguing that how much academy players (Brahim/Foden) play isn't important to...how much academy players will be involved. Surely you can see that makes no sense.

If kids are getting into the first team, no one in the academy will be worrying about us buying the best players in the world, they'll be excited by the quality of teammates they'll have when they break through. If Foden can make it into the first team with Silva, Gundogan, KDB & Bernardo, then no one will be thinking about how we have 2 players in their position.

 

[BlueisCity]

I'm not going to argue semantics over your interpretation of my argument with you. Your whole point of no one will care about Campbell if Foden/Brahim feature is a correct but it is not the underlying problem. My whole point is the underlying problem that we have always chosen the easy option which is to buy a player which is tried and tested rather than have faith in a youngster. Until that changes, I can't see much changing. If Brahim or Foden impress this year, and we don't buy another player in their position next year, then sure my viewpoint will change. They key point being is our spending and transfers are main drivers of how much academy players will be involved, not giving Brahim/Foden some minutes.

How many games do you honestly expect to see Brahim/Foden in?

 

[Hamsterdam95]

I expect Foden to get 1-3 late subs in C1C cup and Brahim to get 1-3 late subs and 1-3 starts in the cups and maybe some appearances in the league. But the main thing for me is if we buy another midfielder the next summer window. If we do, then progression of Brahim/Foden will stop.

 

[WallyA]

I'm not going to argue semantics over your interpretation of my argument with you. Your whole point of no one will care about Campbell if Foden/Brahim feature is a correct but it is not the underlying problem. My whole point is the underlying problem that we have always chosen the easy option which is to buy a player which is tried and tested rather than have faith in a youngster. Until that changes, I can't see much changing. If Brahim or Foden impress this year, and we don't buy another player in their position next year, then sure my viewpoint will change. They key point being is our spending and transfers are main drivers of how much academy players will be involved, not giving Brahim/Foden some minutes.

I understand some of your points, but sometimes the arguments are weak. The fullback example is poor, we bought 3 fullbacks... because we let go of 3 fullbacks, this isn't a problem for me, Maffeo still has a pathway.

Iheanacho doesn't have the ball control to play in Pep's team, Pep played him last season to see if he can fit with the squad and it was always awkward, same way Mangala is kind of awkward with our squad.

Denayer is a fuck up by City, and was a singular case of one bad situation we made in the past, unlike the Rony Lopes case, where City and Pellegrini had a miscommunication (funnily) where Pellegrini wanted him loaned, and City thought he meant to sell him.

I'm all for advocating for youth, but Sancho's case of not seeing a way in at 17 is very odd to me, considering he hasn't even played a full season of EDS football.

I always said I want youth players in the team when they're ready to regularly contribute, someone like Roberts is ready for that squad role. The whole give them a few minutes when a game is done is a nice sentiment, but ultimately means little for the players progression, it is far FAR better to loan them out and have them play regularly in another league than get 300 minutes over the course of a season as a sub player.

Diaz and Foden looked very good, but let's not rush them, they aren't even adults, Foden should play full EDS and some time in a cup game here and there, while Diaz should be loaned out to Malaga or Girona.

Last season was not a good metric to judge the squad on, people are upset we gave Jesus and Fernando minutes, but understand Pep's predicament, he just same in, Jesus and Fernando were very professional in training when they weren't playing, so Pep felt bad and decided to give them minutes.

I am judging Pep's youth integration over a period of time, not just one season, and his track record gives me enough hope.

 

[Hamsterdam95]

I understand some of your points, but sometimes the arguments are weak. The fullback example is poor, we bought 3 fullbacks... because we let go of 3 fullbacks, this isn't a problem for me, Maffeo still has a pathway.

Iheanacho doesn't have the ball control to play in Pep's team, Pep played him last season to see if he can fit with the squad and it was always awkward, same way Mangala is kind of awkward with our squad.

Denayer is a fuck up by City, and was a singular case of one bad situation we made in the past, unlike the Rony Lopes case, where City and Pellegrini had a miscommunication (funnily) where Pellegrini wanted him loaned, and City thought he meant to sell him.

I'm all for advocating for youth, but Sancho's case of not seeing a way in at 17 is very odd to me, considering he hasn't even played a full season of EDS football.

I always said I want youth players in the team when they're ready to regularly contribute, someone like Roberts is ready for that squad role. The whole give them a few minutes when a game is done is a nice sentiment, but ultimately means little for the players progression, it is far FAR better to loan them out and have them play regularly in another league than get 300 minutes over the course of a season as a sub player.

Diaz and Foden looked very good, but let's not rush them, they aren't even adults, Foden should play full EDS and some time in a cup game here and there, while Diaz should be loaned out to Malaga or Girona.

Last season was not a good metric to judge the squad on, people are upset we gave Jesus and Fernando minutes, but understand Pep's predicament, he just same in, Jesus and Fernando were very professional in training when they weren't playing, so Pep felt bad and decided to give them minutes.

I am judging Pep's youth integration over a period of time, not just one season, and his track record gives me enough hope.

I agree we should not rush Foden or Brahim and that we shouldn't judge Pep on just last season.

But for Sancho point, I honestly don't understand why people can't see he wants to leave. We have bought so many young players who can play in his position and we are rumored to buy Mbappe or Dembele aswell. In 2 years, when it's time for him to be a regular first team member, I wonder how much young attackers we will have bought. Barca didn't go buy 4 of the most promising young attackers when Messi was 15/16. Put yourself in his shoes, you are 16/17 and you have seen your club buy players and not give players who were deserving of a chance a chance. Then on top of that, Sancho doesn't have an affinity to City like Foden does. Yes we might have shiny facilities, good pitches and a world class coach. But young players don't need all that to be top players. Players like Yaya, Silva, Aguero, KDB, Hazard, Sanchez all have one thing in common, and it's not any of the things above, it's that they consistently played first team football at a young age. We at City can't offer that. Hence, Sancho leaves where HE believes he will get a shot at first team minutes, atleast more minute than he will get at City.

 

[cookster]

I expect Foden to get 1-3 late subs in C1C cup and Brahim to get 1-3 late subs and 1-3 starts in the cups and maybe some appearances in the league. But the main thing for me is if we buy another midfielder the next summer window. If we do, then progression of Brahim/Foden will stop.

Depends on the midfield position. We'll be all in for DM next season, that will have zero affect on Diaz and Foden