John Stones transfer saga

[Khalekan]

That bloody Andy Gray was proved right,grrrr

Not just Andy......but every freakin' knowitall pundit from Adrian Durham to Robbie Savage.

That is even more sickening than the TR itself.

 

[Khalekan]

Evans is a confirmed screw up. The lad is a disaster. Van Dijk has all the hallmarks of a class player. He'll leave Celtic this window and go to a top club.

Especially now they are out the CL.

 

[The Equaliser]

He's not even started 40 games for us. He's barely into his twenties and has recently signed a five year contract.

At the end of this summer is the Euro Championship which he's very keen to assert himself in the England team for. He needs to be playing regularly for that.

Selling up every time a player hands in a transfer request only validates that behaviour and encourages it further.

Go out and sign a few centre backs, tell him that we refuse his transfer request and tell his agent to pipe down. What is he doing to do?

The alternative is letting him go and the respectability of a once ace football club. Show them we mean business.

Good post Azul but you know as well as I do that this is now only about securing the best possible deal.

The timing of it stinks and may possibly have been carefully stage managed. Hopefully not to the extent that he goes on deadline day and we don't get to spend the money.

But I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case.

 

[BoysInBlue]

Yep, and that was absurd too

Sell sell sell

And do what with the money?

A fair amount goes to Barnsley.

The rest would most likely be wasted and the team would be worse off.

Keep keep keep.

 

[BoysInBlue]

Good post Azul but you know as well as I do that this is now only about securing the best possible deal.

The timing of it stinks and may possibly have been carefully stage managed. Hopefully not to the extent that he goes on deadline day and we don't get to spend the money.

But I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case.

We need to make a stand at some point otherwise we need to stop this pretence of having any kind of ambition that lives up to our glory days in the past.

 

[JustOpp]

Yip.

And if Ross steps up and fulfills his potential this season we have this whole sorry saga to look forward to again next summer.

Just a gut feeling, but I think Ross will be different. Teams will come for him, but something about him (and not just the Scouse accent) screams "I'm not going anywhere."

 

[Barkley1878]

Good post Azul but you know as well as I do that this is now only about securing the best possible deal.

The timing of it stinks and may possibly have been carefully stage managed. Hopefully not to the extent that he goes on deadline day and we don't get to spend the money.

But I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case.

Thought this myself, it's clear the board have looked at our biggest sellable assets (Lukaku, Barkley, Stones and Mccarthy) and thought out the bunch Stones would fetch the most cash/be the easiest to replace.

Like I've said earlier providing we sold him for that £40 mil mark and had all the cash to reinvest I think we could come out the transfer window much stronger and more depth in the squad (imagine a bench with the likes of Austin, Deloufeu and Lennon as options)

But I have a bad feeling he'll go for £35 mil + possible add ons which we'll probably never see.

 

[The Equaliser]

We need to make a stand at some point otherwise we need to stop this pretence of having any kind of ambition that lives up to our glory days in the past.

Are we still pretending though ? That is the question. Not sure we are tbh.

 

[Barkley1878]

Just a gut feeling, but I think Ross will be different. Teams will come for him, but something about him (and not just the Scouse accent) screams "I'm not going anywhere."

Depends if our idiot boo boy fans don't push him away.

 

[The Equaliser]

Thought this myself, it's clear the board have looked at our biggest sellable assets (Lukaku, Barkley, Stones and Mccarthy) and thought out the bunch Stones would fetch the most cash/be the easiest to replace.

Like I've said earlier providing we sold him for that £40 mil mark and had all the cash to reinvest I think we could come out the transfer window much stronger and more depth in the squad (imagine a bench with the likes of Austin, Deloufeu and Lennon as options)

But I have a bad feeling he'll go for £35 mil + possible add ons which we'll probably never see.

Can't see us coming out of this smelling of roses at all, especially given the timing of it.

Said about 500 pages ago if this had been done before the season started and a good price received with all the money to be re-invested it just might have been a bit easier to swallow.

At this stage any buys will reek of panic and be over-priced, new defenders won't have time to bed in, Barnsley have to get their 15%, etc, etc.

At this stage of the window it's a disaster if he goes, there are no 2 ways of looking at it.

 

[Dylan]

We do when drinking milk and presented with something unexpectedly hilarious.

My point is that EFC are portraying Stones as the type of player who would be earning over 100k if he played at certain other clubs, yet he is only on 30k a week. EFC are portraying Stones as a top level talent, the type that should be vying for the title and in the CL, yet the club have done nothing to show ambitions of reaching this level.

EFC more than any other party, in my opinion, have swelled Stones head and made him think "ah, maybe I've already out grown non-CL clubs, non title challenging clubs, and certainly I belong at a club willing to pay me what I'm apparently worth".

I just think there has been a lot of naivety in how the clubs stance would affect the player and ignorance in terms of protecting one of the clubs strongest assets.

I love how people trot out wages like fact. The only fact is we have no idea how much EFC are paying him. If he was silly enough, knowing his own potential, to sign a sub-standard deal 12 months ago, that is his problem, not EFC's.

The only relevant things are this. He signed a 5 year contract 12 months ago. Everton value him more than 30mill GBP. If Chelsea want him, considering the talent potential, coupled with the length of the contract, then they will have to meet Everton's valuation.

IMO Everton have nothing to lose with not settling for a fee below what they want. Best case, Stones stays and stays in the team, maintaining his professionalism and does his part for the team. Worst case scenario, Stones stays, has a huff, is out of the team for a while, but then realises if he wants to be part of the international setup he needs to be playing.

 

[Mogwai]

I didn't think he was like that.....The utter swine.....The real question is how will this affect his performances on the pitch? ... I seriously can't understand why he would want to move, at least wait until next summer FFS. Why does he feel like he needs to rush it? It will only be bad for his development in my opinion.

 

[Spadge Vernacular]

I didn't think he was like that.....The utter swine.....The real question is how will this affect his performances on the pitch? ... I seriously can't understand why he would want to move, at least wait until next summer FFS. Why does he feel like he needs to rush it? It will only be bad for his development in my opinion.

Same reason as Jeffers, Rooney and co.

 

[deipnosophist]

no we wont get that amount. the tv money has been spent on lukaku payments and paying off the vibrac loan. any money left has been spent on deulofeu. any other players coming in would have been loans or payed for by new loans.
even if stones is sold , we would only get a fraction of the money as a down payment .
to buy quality instantly we would again have to get another loan on the stones fee and some of that fee eventually would be used to pay off the loans interest.
so 30 million coming in , soon changes into less than 30 million that we can actually spend out.

I concur. Everton had 28mio of debt maturing in the May 2015 year. Assume paid off and you get the following cash flows

Bank Balance open 18mio
Cash from 2015 ops 20 mio
Debtors money received 30mio
Creditor monies paid (10 mio)
Lukaku payment (12mio)
Barry (plus odds and sods) (5mio)
Finance costs (4mio)
Debt Repayment (28 mio)
Cash from 2016 ops to date (0)
Deulofeu (4mio)
Sth American guys (5 mio)

Overall (Bank Balance now) NIL

So any body coming in post these latin american blokes was either going to have to be a loan, or funded from fresh debt. I think the sale of Stones (although it won't be cash on delivery), extinguishes any apprehension on drawing fresh debt to get cash. How much ? your guess is as good as mine. You would think though that 50% will be cash up front...so say 17mio plus whatever debt is drawn.
NB .You can follow most large transfer movements through the cash flow and working capital accounts. Unfortunately there is a very opaque P/L item called 'other operating costs'...keep an eye on this in the 2017 accounts (I'm assuming a 17 mio debtor item (Stones) in the 2016 books.

 

[Mogwai]

Same reason as Jeffers, Rooney and co.

I know, but he seemed smarter than them.... If he is guaranteed a starting spot in the first 11 I could understand.