John Stones

[RandomJ]

without watching it am almost certain there is no footage of him heading the ball. not his forte but he has great potential and should city buy him that is what you will pay for.

He's 6 foot 2 he isn't terrible in the air.

 

[Shaelumstash]

The issue is this is not true see this from todays mediawatch on f365

There are many in the industry happy to insist that nobody just makes up transfer rumours; there has to be a truth somewhere. While Mediawatch is happy to accept that at face value, it is interesting to see how a rumour can gain traction with very little evidence.

Take the example of Romelu Lukaku, for example:

1) In the early hours of Tuesday morning, spurious Italian transfer website transfermarketweb.com claims that Romelu Lukaku could leave Everton for £40m.

‘According to latest rumours gathered through TMW sources, Belgian international striker Romelu Lukaku (23) is getting more and more likely to leave Everton for good and join Chelsea back.

Still tracked by Atletico Madrid, Napoli, AS Roma and Manchester City as well, Toffees star will be moving on an about €48/£40m offer.’

That website handily shows the number of views of each story. On that short piece, there have been 1,672 hits.

2) Later on Tuesday morning, somebody at the Daily Star had seen that story, probably via an aggregator like Newsnow.com.

‘Chelsea close in on £40m deal for in-demand Premier League ace – reports,’ is the Star’s headline.

‘Lukaku has emerged as one of the Premier League’s top strikers since Chelsea allowed him to join the Toffees for £28m two summers ago.

‘They are said to have beaten off competition from a number of top European clubs, including Manchester City and Atletico Madrid.’

Already, ‘getting more likely’ has become ‘closes in on deal’, and ‘still tracked by’ (present tense) has become ‘Chelsea have beaten off competition’ (past tense).

Again the fee is mentioned at £40m, despite there being no way on this earth that Everton will sell Lukaku at that price.

Finally, the story is written by Jamie Styles. The same Jamie Styles reported five days earlier that Chelsea had made an ‘opening bid’ of £50m for Lukaku. They’re probably not going to accept £40m now.



3) By Tuesday afternoon, the Daily Telegraph are all over the story.

‘Another forward on Chelsea’s radar is Romelu Lukaku, who, according to the Daily Star, is edging closer to a Stamford Bridge return after Chelsea launched a £40m bid for him over the weekenf (sic),’ that story reads.

Crucially, the Telegraph don’t want to quote transfermarketweb.com, so instead credit the Daily Star as the source. This is needed to give the story more kudos.

In addition, the Telegraph have added a detail about Chelsea ‘launching a bid’ for Lukaku ‘over the weekend’, despite neither the Star nor TMW mentioning a bid of any sort, let alone one made at a particular time. Has that merely been added for effect?

From a story on a website that got 1,672 hits to a website that in March released figures indicating daily traffic of 4.3m, all because nobody really cares if a story is true just so long as it gets clicks.

Finally, Mediawatch cannot stress this enough: Romelu Lukaku will not be moving to Chelsea for £40m this summer.

Just as a follow up mate, the Mail, the Guardian and the Times are all reporting exactly the same story about Stones on their back page this morning.

Every article mentions City offered £40m and Everton want £50m. Every article mentons they expect the deal to be finalised in the next few days. Every article mentions Mangala is likely to leave on loan. Every article mentions Fernandinho could slot in at centre back.

All 3 journalists who wrote the stories are currently out in Shenzhen. So is Txiki.

I would be absolutely stunned if this story wasn't based on a brief from the club.

We got next to zero coverage of our tour to the States last year, I can't remember if any of the nationals even bothered to send anyone to cover it. This time though, all of the national press have a man following City to Shenzhen and they're all reporting exactly the same transfer stories. I would be very surprised if this wasn't the club throwing the journo's some bones as a reward for covering the tour.

 

[chesterguy]

Just as a follow up mate, the Mail, the Guardian and the Times are all reporting exactly the same story about Stones on their back page this morning.

Every article mentions City offered £40m and Everton want £50m. Every article mentons they expect the deal to be finalised in the next few days. Every article mentions Mangala is likely to leave on loan. Every article mentions Fernandinho could slot in at centre back.

All 3 journalists who wrote the stories are currently out in Shenzhen. So is Txiki.

I would be absolutely stunned if this story wasn't based on a brief from the club.

We got next to zero coverage of our tour to the States last year, I can't remember if any of the nationals even bothered to send anyone to cover it. This time though, all of the national press have a man following City to Shenzhen and they're all reporting exactly the same transfer stories. I would be very surprised if this wasn't the club throwing the journo's some bones as a reward for covering the tour.

The same story is also in the sporting life and Liverpool Echo are they out with city. The point is once a story is published wherever that may be then other media outlets can say "sources" and then repeat the story sky do it all the time. So just because it is in the media does not make it true. If it were every team every transfer window would be buying 40 new players a season

 

[mAAdcity]

Fascinating, thanks for posting. It's interesting to see how the transfer mill operates. All signs certainly point towards a brief from Txiki.

Is the press's increased interest in our preseason tour down to the Pep effect or a different factor?

 

[vincent]

The same story is also in the sporting life and Liverpool Echo are they out with city. The point is once a story is published wherever that may be then other media outlets can say "sources" and then repeat the story sky do it all the time. So just because it is in the media does not make it true. If it were every team every transfer window would be buying 40 new players a season

Nah. I understand the point you make, but when this is reported widely by all the press guys who are covering our tour then they have defo been briefied by someone at City.

 

[chesterguy]

Nah. I understand the point you make, but when this is reported widely by all the press guys who are covering our tour then they have defo been briefied by someone at City.

But as you acknowledged it is also widely reported by all the press guys who are NOT on tour.. were they also briefed by Txiki

 

[MillionDollarDream]

Might be,might not be of significance but I thought it was interesting Moreno said he was signing on Saturday of all days and he was linked with this "triple swoop" with Sané/Stones.
Could this brief lead to all 3 being signed then?

 

[Centurions]

Might be,might not be of significance but I thought it was interesting Moreno said he was signing on Saturday of all days and he was linked with this "triple swoop" with Sané/Stones.
Could this brief lead to all 3 being signed then?

Doubt any two would be signed on the same day (let alone all three) due to the work that goes into it all, even after everything is agreed. Being announced on the same day of course is much easier.

 

[ADegenerate]

Doubt any two would be signed on the same day (let alone all three) due to the work that goes into it all, even after everything is agreed. Being announced on the same day of course is much easier.

You think we'd wait to announce Jesus until after the olympics are over?

 

[the_game_161]

Hopefully all this is done in the next few weeks. Don't want to leave it too late.