2021/22 Lucas Digne

[kenada_blue]

I remember a bunch of people on here demanding we sell Gana at one stage because he was "too old"

Some people think that once you hit 28 you're basically finished

The minute we buy someone that's 28 a load of people go "ergh, no resale".

 

[Fansince1988]

Myth.

No fact he’s defending in the main is quite poor

 

[Fansince1988]

We don't defend great without him either

Well time will tell when the new LB settles in, rest of the time we have been playing with a LB who isn’t a LB Godfrey or Coleman.

 

[kenada_blue]

Bout at the same time we been crying out for a new right back for years with Coleman past his peak, I think this was the right time to move the player on and bring somebody in younger

Thats down to poor strategy. Coleman has steadily gone downhill since 2017 post leg break. Sidibe, Kenny, Holgate were the 3 supposedly going to step in.

Again...unless we'd force to sell, no one would buying.

 

[kenada_blue]

No fact he’s defending in the main is quite poor

He may have poor games (which get more fondly remembered than good games). But statistically, he still up there defensively with the best in the league.

 

[phil_t98]

Thats down to poor strategy. Coleman has steadily gone downhill since 2017 post leg break. Sidibe, Kenny, Holgate were the 3 supposedly going to step in.

Again...unless we'd force to sell, no one would buying.

So is it not prudent to sell a player befor he goes downhill? Utd have always been good at moving players on and bringing the next payer through

 

[Fansince1988]

He may have poor games (which get more fondly remembered than good games). But statistically, he still up there defensively with the best in the league.

Sorry I don’t agree, it’s ok when we are on the front foot in games, but I’ve always worried about his defending when we are up against it, some of that does go down to who else we are playing on the left. Baines and Piennar were a very good combination, but Baines did know when to stay back, Digne wants to go forward all the time which is all well and good, but there’s times he should be doing his main job defending. Sometimes you have to look beyond hes free kicks and great crosses, but they have also been missing in recent times, even before Benitez came here.

 

[Houghty19]

It depends who wants your players. If Utd or city or even Chelsea want one of your top players, there’s a good chance you can add on an extra 30%.

Fair enough it just seems cheap for a bloke who can be influential on his day, but we are left with whatever we can get for him i suppose after the "falling out".

 

[The binman chronicles]

The mistake we have been making is not selling players before hitting 30. We keep players way too long then we cant get rid. We have 2 young full backs now. Obviously they won't be on fully ready but we give them time to develop. I want to see more of this.

If we had a team capable of winning trophies/finishing high up in the league you keep Digne, whilst we are rebuilding you have to take advantage of a players worth. We aren't flush with sponsorship money to let every player who has basically 'settled' on playing/being a sub to run beyond being an actual asset. We've done it countless times recently and it needs to stop, that starts with how much we pay in wages to ensure other clubs can match or at least get close.

Eventually that will and should happen to Richarlison and DCL, we either are able to compete to make them want to stay or their sales fund the next wave.

I remember a bunch of people on here demanding we sell Gana at one stage because he was "too old"

Some people think that once you hit 28 you're basically finished

I don't think many wanted him sold, just squared the fact that he wanted to go to PSG with the hope that perhaps we could buy a tenacious defensive midfielder who has a range of passing and can grab 3/4 goals a season. Perhaps Gbamin was that but we'll never know. Everton that.

 

[Saint Domingo]

So our spine of the squad, pre Moshiri, and before we had no FFP.

Jagielka was still one of the best CB in the prem by 30. Baines was still an England international by 30. Cahill was still scoring in 8+ a season at 30.

Additionally...no other clubs wanted them for the value we put on them..apart from Bayern who were interested in Baines.

Exactly my point. The last time we did this was pre FFP. We could afford to keep Baines until he retired as we could just buy Digne outright with cash to replace him. Same with Jagielka, we could have sold him to Arsenal who were interested in his prime and then reinvested the cash but instead we let him go for nothing then splurged money on Michael Keane.

We can’t do that any more. We have to sell Digne to get his replacement in. We had to sell Gueye to allow us to buy Gomes and Gbamin (which would have been the right thing to do if both didn’t get injured immediately and return to a poor level)

Until we can move past the FFP problem Koeman and Allardyce stored up for us we can’t keep hold of top assets as they decline.

 

[kenada_blue]

So is it not prudent to sell a player befor he goes downhill? Utd have always been good at moving players on and bringing the next payer through

The fitness levels players are at now, it's ridiculous to just pull the plug on a player who's still performing...just because he could "go downhill".

United allways eyed up an improved replacement, they never willfully sold one of their better players because they hit 30. Fergie brought Scholes back at 36 cos there was no one better than him to add quality.

The Digne situation is completely different as it's a fallout with the manager rather than it being a strategic move to get rid of an aging asset at a high value. No fallout, he's still playing cos he's a good player.

 

[BlueToff]

What Lucas Digne has done speaks volumes and Everton could pay the price

Michael Ball tackles the situation at Everton between Lucas Digne and manager Rafael Benitez

www.liverpoolecho.co.uk

@BlueToff thoughts?

Don't really agree with the 'mentality' shouts and Ball generally comes across as a bit of a numpty a lot of times, stuck in the 90s/early 00s football era. I agree with his first few paragraphs. He declared himself 'unfit' for Chelsea - well he only posted one social media post with his child on the Friday after the game on the Thursday. If that is suddenly wrong for someone who felt unwell on the Wednesday to do then it's news to me.

I agree on both parties being at least partially to blame. I think Digne has every right to challenge the manager's approach and Benitez has every right to show him who's boss - and he did that with the Arsenal game. That should have been it, that should have been the job done and Digne was back in the side. But Benitez's man management is so poor. Compare it to the Lukaku situation. It is slightly different because Lukaku did it publicly but if anything that is worse. Digne didn't do anything publicly (as in himself come out and say anything publicly). Benitez just doesn't have the capacity/man management to even get players back on side. And I genuinely think he doesn't understand why that is...

We knew we were getting a bad man manager but we hoped that his tactical nous would trade it off. Unfortunately, whatever tactical nous he had, as me and many others had suspected, appears to be long gone.

 

[kenada_blue]

Exactly my point. The last time we did this was pre FFP. We could afford to keep Baines until he retired as we could just buy Digne outright with cash to replace him. Same with Jagielka, we could have sold him to Arsenal who were interested in his prime and then reinvested the cash but instead we let him go for nothing then splurged money on Michael Keane.

We can’t do that any more. We have to sell Digne to get his replacement in. We had to sell Gueye to allow us to buy Gomes and Gbamin (which would have been the right thing to do if both didn’t get injured immediately and return to a poor level)

Until we can move past the FFP problem Koeman and Allardyce stored up for us we can’t keep hold of top assets as they decline.

But they were still performing at a high level and would've been difficult to buy a similar or better version without spending more.

We sold Lescott at 27 and bought Distin at 31. No change in quality for example.

Personally this age thing to justify transfers regardless of quality is just something I can't get onboard with.

 

[BlueToff]

The fitness levels players are at now, it's ridiculous to just pull the plug on a player who's still performing...just because he could "go downhill".

United allways eyed up an improved replacement, they never willfully sold one of their better players because they hit 30. Fergie brought Scholes back at 36 cos there was no one better than him to add quality.

The Digne situation is completely different as it's a fallout with the manager rather than it being a strategic move to get rid of an aging asset at a high value. No fallout, he's still playing cos he's a good player.

Exactly. And... he could still have been up for sale. He'd just have been playing and we'd have been able to sell the player without every man and his dog knowing that Benitez wanted him gone and Digne didn't want to play (for Benitez). Just plod along and then sell and reinvest as we have done.

Could have got Mykolenko in as we have done and made Digne available but the desperation wouldn't be there. Yeah, we may need the money but it wouldn't be like it is now that if Digne doesn't go, we'll have a £25-30m asset on big wages who won't play.

I think both sides are to blame but Benitez is meant to be the adult in the room and 'put the team first'. He acts like a child and doesn't do that.

We have a left-back so fortunately, we have cover for the position now. It's short-term pain mind because we are definitely weakening the side for the foreseeable. Mykolenko is simply nowhere near Digne's level, yet. He may well be and the good thing is we're going to have a young player on our hands who can continue to develop.

 

[ForeverBlue92]

But they were still performing at a high level and would've been difficult to buy a similar or better version without spending more.

We sold Lescott at 27 and bought Distin at 31. No change in quality for example.

Personally this age thing to justify transfers regardless of quality is just something I can't get onboard with.

Prior to FFP dat mate.

Would be silly doing dat these days unless FFP wasn't a problem for you.

Sadly for us we are close to the limit - Digne oot and 3-4 signings in makes sense ultimately.

Just got to hope the new signings are of a good quality.