William Carvalho

[Floating]

This is as non starter transfer as you can get, the guy is owned by 2/3 different parties and will cost a fee similar to Özil.

Bit more optimism please Mr. Deep :cry: .

Nothing to be optimistic about here. We don't sign 40M players from the Portuguese league, and again, the guy has been linked to Utd in recent months not us.

Won't be posting or reading this thread again, waste of time. I'll give you all £100 each if we sign Carvalho. Anyway, surprised no link to Chelsea considering his cousin played there.

I highly doubt he'd cost 40m - probably more like 18-25. Also, Chelsea just signed Matic who is a similar player.

 

[GDeep™]

He has a 40M release clause. Portuguese clubs always get top dollar for their best talent, Mangala is valued at 40M too.

@ Giroud, I was messing, I know they're not related.

 

[MutableEarth]

I reckon he'll leave for no more than £25m

 

[DJ_Markstar]

This is as non starter transfer as you can get, the guy is owned by 2/3 different parties and will cost a fee similar to Özil.

Bit more optimism please Mr. Deep :cry: .

Nothing to be optimistic about here. We don't sign 40M players from the Portuguese league, and again, the guy has been linked to Utd in recent months not us.

Won't be posting or reading this thread again, waste of time. I'll give you all £100 each if we sign Carvalho. Anyway, surprised no link to Chelsea considering his cousin played there.

 

[Floating]

He has a 40M release clause. Portuguese clubs always get top dollar for their best talent, Mangala is valued at 40M too.

Release cause rarely means the price players end up going for, unless it's an undervalued clause. Porto gets top dollar, but not necessarily Sporting. Again, I would surprised if he goes for more than 18-20m.

 

[cannonade]

He has a 40M release clause. Portuguese clubs always get top dollar for their best talent, Mangala is valued at 40M too.

Release cause rarely means the price players end up going for, unless it's an undervalued clause. Porto gets top dollar, but not necessarily Sporting. Again, I would surprised if he goes for more than 18-20m.

Bargain. Sign the man up.

 

[ScotVieira]

I've only seen youtube clips.
However if he is very good, we should sign him (if we can) even for 40m Euros. It just means we have a top quality player with us for years and we wont be desperate for that position for a many years to come. If we sign him and a top striker, I reckon we'll be fantastic for next season.

 

[The_Playmaker]

I cannot see the justification in spending over £20 million on a defensive midfielder. It is a ridiculous amount of money and a total waste. More comical is that people are making the prediction that he will be world class, but on what exactly?

He dictates play? Under what pressure exactly? He dominated Cameroons midfield? What midfield do Cameroon even have? Is he playing Champions League football? No. Is he playing in a highly competitive league? No. Wenger would never waste that amount of money on a defensive midfielder. Pure specialist defensive midfielders should cost no more than £15 million. We got Flamini for free FFS and he does a good job. We just need a younger version of him, and I would bet money on Wenger finding a cheaper version than spending a stupid amount of money just because someone is being hyped up.

 

[DanDare]

I cannot see the justification in spending over £20 million on a defensive midfielder. It is a ridiculous amount of money and a total waste. More comical is that people are making the prediction that he will be world class, but on what exactly?

He dictates play? Under what pressure exactly? He dominated Cameroons midfield? What midfield do Cameroon even have? Is he playing Champions League football? No. Is he playing in a highly competitive league? No. Wenger would never waste that amount of money on a defensive midfielder. Pure specialist defensive midfielders should cost no more than £15 million. We got Flamini for free FFS and he does a good job. We just need a younger version of him, and I would bet money on Wenger finding a cheaper version than spending a stupid amount of money just because someone is being hyped up.

I do agree with the core of your post but there are definitely a few players in the holding role that are worth more than £20m or were at their prime. I don't think it's a position where that much money can never be spent...

 

[ArsenesNO1Fan]

I cannot see the justification in spending over £20 million on a defensive midfielder. It is a ridiculous amount of money and a total waste. More comical is that people are making the prediction that he will be world class, but on what exactly?

He dictates play? Under what pressure exactly? He dominated Cameroons midfield? What midfield do Cameroon even have? Is he playing Champions League football? No. Is he playing in a highly competitive league? No. Wenger would never waste that amount of money on a defensive midfielder. Pure specialist defensive midfielders should cost no more than £15 million. We got Flamini for free FFS and he does a good job. We just need a younger version of him, and I would bet money on Wenger finding a cheaper version than spending a stupid amount of money just because someone is being hyped up.

Well we supposedly bid 25m for Bender didn't we?

I think we should have gone for Strootman, Untied definitely should have done

 

[CurryFlavoured]

I agree about Playmaker on defensive midfielders. Over £20m on a guy who's going to sit in front of the defence is criminal, we should be looking at Schneiderlin who'll cost a fraction of this guy's fee.

 

[CurryFlavoured]

My description was probably a bit simplistic but I was specifically talking about us and I don't think we need something extra special to sit in midfield with Ramsey. I'd be able to live with someone physically very good, decent positionally and not an oaf with the ball at his feet, ie. a bigger version of Flamini basically (hopefully with better discipline).

I don't think our defensive midfield signing needs to be as comfortable on the ball as Arteta, in fact I wouldn't care if he doesn't contribute much at all going forward. I want someone who excels in defending from midfield, leave the attacking to Özil, Ramsey etc. It's not a flashy position, or at least it doesn't need to be.

 

[kofigunner]

So forgetting Schneiderlin for a moment, I disagree with the general characterisation of the role of a DM in today's world(not related to your post, Curry), especially for a team like us. In our current system (we don't truly have a DM who just sits there protecting the defence, and most top teams rarely do. Today's DM must be able to be a more than decent passer from deep, retain possession and keep things tidy whilst performing his primary role in breaking up attacks. A DM for us is more of a deeper lying CM. It's the reason that players like Xabi Alonso are highly rated. Personally I don't like the idea of putting a financial ceiling on a particular position because it tends to lead to teams not treating that position with the importance it deserves. That's what happened when Real Madrid got rid of Makélélé. To quote then club president Florentino Pérez,

We will not miss Makélelé. His technique is average, he lacks the speed and skill to take the ball past opponents, and ninety percent of his distribution either goes backwards or sideways. He wasn't a header of the ball and he rarely passed the ball more than three metres. Younger players will arrive who will cause Makélelé to be forgotten

.
Zidane's opinion differs on that,

Why put another layer of gold paint on the Bentley when you are losing the entire engine?

.
A good DM can be the engine that drives the whole team, allows attackers to attack and defenders to breathe easier.
I get it that the 'sexier' attacking type players cost more but a good DM can win you games too. To be clear, my opinions on this are general, not related to Carvalho who I don't know that much about.
Ok, back to Schneiderlin. I wouldn't mind someone like him, though Bender still remains my current top choice .

 

[Floating]

I agree about Playmaker on defensive midfielders. Over £20m on a guy who's going to sit in front of the defence is criminal, we should be looking at Schneiderlin who'll cost a fraction of this guy's fee.

Schneiderlin wouldn't cost much less than £20m, I reckon. Buying from other PL clubs is generally pretty overpriced, and he's a starter on a mid-table team that's been doing very well.

 

[kofigunner]

My description was probably a bit simplistic but I was specifically talking about us and I don't think we need something extra special to sit in midfield with Ramsey. I'd be able to live with someone physically very good, decent positionally and not an oaf with the ball at his feet, ie. a bigger version of Flamini basically (hopefully with better discipline).

I don't think our defensive midfield signing needs to be as comfortable on the ball as Arteta, in fact I wouldn't care if he doesn't contribute much at all going forward. I want someone who excels in defending from midfield, leave the attacking to Özil, Ramsey etc. It's not a flashy position, or at least it doesn't need to be.

I'll use Chelsea as an example. They had Mikel but 'upgraded' to Nemanja Matic because he seems to keep the ball moving better(for one thing). He isn't a deep lying play maker per-se but I notice that he does have a very good passing range. Fernandinho for City after a slow start, has turned out to be brilliant for them. Would you turn down a DM/Deep lying playmaker type player like Bender or Gundogan because he cost 30 mill? That's what I'm trying to get at.

 

[CurryFlavoured]

@Floating

Maybe, he seems to have fallen under the radar a bit more this season so you'd hope they would take £10-15m. He's young and proven in the league as well, if he could form a partnership with Ramsey that would be our midfield sorted for 5+ years. This Carvalho lad does look very talented from the little I've seen but you're probably talking about £30m with him.

 

[CurryFlavoured]

@kofi

Gundogan's a fantastic player, but given the opportunity I'd prefer a midfielder who excel's in defending as I said. Gundogan is similar to Ramsey in that he's more of an all round midfielder, but they both also need someone sitting behind them so I don't think the defence would have a fun time with Gundogan and Ramsey in front of them. It's similar to the Ramsey + Wilshere midfield problem but Gundogan can actually defend, so it wouldn't be as disastrous.

Bender is more of a pure defensive midfielder, which brings me back to argument #1 - that that kind of money is crazy for a defensive midfielder.

I'd like to 'sacrifice' (I guess you could say) one of the deep midfield positions for someone who will offer much more defensively then offensively, as Flamini and Arteta have been doing I guess but I'm talking someone younger and hopefully better. I don't think we need another flashy midfielder - we have Özil, Santi, Ramsey etc. to do the creating and Theo and hopefully a new striker to stick them away, let's sign someone who can stop decent opposition walking through our midfield. If this is the route we're going down (and I really hope it is) I don't think we need to spend big bucks.

 

[Johnny_Blaze]

Gundogan's defensive attributes are hugely underrated. What stood out for me in Dortmund's semi-final matches against Madrid and in the final was what an excellent tackler Gundogan is and his Makalele-esque strength. He was the best midfielder in all three matches and his ability to detect danger at the back was excellent.

He's probably Wenger's dream midfield signing. In a fantasy world, I see him as a perfect partner for Ramsey.

In my fantasy world, he partners Pogba deeper in midfield with Ramsey and Özil ahead.

*leans back on could nine with an orgasmic look*

 

[Sydney Gooner]

So are you suggesting a hatchet man like Tiote CF? One of those African-French brutes K-Dog or Guilavogui could do the trick for under £15 million.

 

[Sydney Gooner]

Gundogan's defensive attributes are hugely underrated. What stood out for me in Dortmund's semi-final matches against Madrid and in the final was what an excellent tackler Gundogan is and his Makalele-esque strength. He was the best midfielder in all three matches and his ability to detect danger at the back was excellent.

He's probably Wenger's dream midfield signing. In a fantasy world, I see him as a perfect partner for Ramsey.

In my fantasy world, he partners Pogba deeper in midfield with Ramsey and Özil ahead.

*leans back on could nine with an orgasmic look*

A double pivot of Pogba and Gündoğan would render Ramsey redundant.