Patrik Berger tells Gareth Barry To join Liverpool

[Vermilion]

O'Neil says Berger has played his last game for Villa after comments he made about Barry joining Liverpool. Surprise Surprise.

[JPK]

Elisha_Scott says he has heard the names of potential signings and they are uninspiring.
One has a good cv but is somebody he would of never thought of.So unpredictable it's mental. The other is a bit better than Pennant with a similar goal ratio.

Cannot name names yet. Valencia must be the latter.
First one is anyones guess.

[Craig_H]

Elisha_Scott says he has heard the names of potential signings and they are uninspiring.
One has a good cv but is somebody he would of never thought of.So unpredictable it's mental. The other is a bit better than Pennant with a similar goal ratio.

Cannot name names yet. Valencia must be the latter.
First one is anyones guess.

Wish i could say i was surprised...

[JPK]

Wish i could say i was surprised...

Not positive by the sounds of it. Sooner DIC takeover the better.

[Leyton388]

ahh **** it if rafa wants to buy duds this summer there is nothing much we can do about it. I will be gutted if barry is the big buy but if he is so be it. But on the other hand if we sign barry then Silva i will be jumping through hoops. The same was said last summer when CB said we were going to sign Forlan and would not be getting Eto or Torres type players. Lets hope it is a **** as lat summer. ROLL EYES

[Craig_H]

This is last chance saloon in the 'stop buying 5 ****e players instead of one brilliant one' game, as far as i'm concerned.

[JPK]

He might be able to name names soon. The guy with the good cv is interesting.
Uninspiring wide player could be Lennon,Valencia,Milner,N'zogbia or the like IMO.

[wiw]

He might be able to name names soon. The guy with the good cv is interesting.
Uninspiring wide player could be Lennon,Valencia,Milner,N'zogbia or the like IMO.

Good cv but completely unexpected..hmm..

doubt it's Lennon, too expensive. Who knows..what forum is ES on ?

[JPK]

Good cv but completely unexpected..hmm..

doubt it's Lennon, too expensive. Who knows..what forum is ES on ?

YNWA.tv

Pires?
Seedorf?
Owen?
Figo?
Garcia?
Deco?
Thuram?
Sagnol?
Christian Vieri

[Leyton388]

This is last chance saloon in the 'stop buying 5 ****e players instead of one brilliant one' game, as far as i'm concerned.

Agree with that completely the time has come to add to Torres, babel, steve ect. the times of wasting 25 to 30 million on squad players has passed. Next season is make or brake for Rafa IMO. Torres is proof enough what £25m+ gets you

[-V-]

Lol. Yeah whatever. Rafa was finally given big money to spend last summer and he bought Torres and Babel. Then he bought Mascherano for big bucks and followed it up with Skrtle. 4 very very good signings.

IF Rafa is given big money again then im sure he'll sign another star. But the fact is that he probably wont be given big money this summer while the turmoil continues in the boardroom.

That is not Rafa's fault. Fact.

Some of you are so naive i would guess you about 12 years old

[Craig_H]

So if he gets £20m to spend, he cant sign a £20m player? Ha!

"When £20m isnt *really* £20m - by -V-"

[El Jefecito]

Seriously, are you not bored making the same points again and again in pretty much every thread?

It seems like you have some kind of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

[Fiddy]

So if he gets £20m to spend, he cant sign a £20m player? Ha!

"When £20m isnt *really* £20m - by -V-"

Seriously, are you not bored making the same points again and again in pretty much every thread?

It seems like you have some kind of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

...and he still hasn't answered my perfectly reasonable question about which position and which player he thinks we need to spunk this £20 mil on...

[dww]

So if he gets £20m to spend, he cant sign a £20m player? Ha!

"When £20m isnt *really* £20m - by -V-"

But surely the argument then becomes about the fact that Rafa feels that he needs a good squad and that when he started he didn't have one. He spends big on big players when he has the money, but he still bought in a decent number to provide the flexibility he feels he needs.

You can argue all you want that one £20m player would have made all the difference but I'm skeptical: we have seen this season how Arsenals small squad fell away. Obviously the counter argument is that they got where they did (above us) without spending as much but then Wenger has had a decade to implement a youth policy which has allowed him to do that and has also by dint of his history in the league been allowed a number of trophy and title challenge free seasons to build a team. The teams who have performed most consistently in recent years have been United and Chelsea and a feature of both has been the options within the squad. Obviously the divide between them and ourselves and Arsenal has been the quality in that squad.

Obviously there is more than one way to skin a cat as the success of the different approaches of the top four PL teams show. I think you have to look at the approach as a whole and it would be a fair judgment if you thought there was someone with a better overall strategy given the available constraints than Rafa for the job. However the specific criticism of the failure to buy in high value players of itself is not a convincing argument to my mind.

Also I think that the signings this summer indicate that Rafa has a good idea of how much big name/value players could bring to the team/squad. I would therefore suggest that previously he has weighed up the costs and benefits and decided that the available players would not have been as good as a number of different tactical options. I think he has probably done enough in his career to deserve the benefit of the doubt on that call.