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John Stones

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catcherintherye said:
I do think people should read @The Esk thread on wage cost implications to probably understand the bigger picture on the Stones front. I don't think it can be put into the Rooney/Rodwell/Arteta/Lescott/Jeffers/Ball camp where we reluctantly sold our best young talent. This is a means to an ends.

Nobody at the club would want to lose John Stones of that I'm certain. We certainly don't need to sell him to make up our transfer kitty that is there anyway and Koeman can sign pretty much any player he likes providing he can convince them to come. However there are real complications when it comes to wages. These are not restrictions placed on the club internally from lack of drive or ambition by the board but external factors from the Premier League. We can only raise wages 7 million a year.

In order to add the 4/5/6 top class international players we want too we need the funds and also a way to get around the wage restrictions. The funds are in place from Moshiri but the wages issue is thorny. We want to be a top 4 team and to do so we will have to probably double our wage bill to be in line with them. We are prevented from doing so. A short term solution is selling Stones for 50 million as it will allow us to raise our wages by 40 million this season on top of the 7 million allowance.

It really is a means to an end. There is a sadness to it but trading at the right moment is an important part of any business. Even if he does go on to be as good as Bobby Moore and captain England is the trade the right one for us to do now, to allow us to add an additional 40 million to our wage bill (IE 6 players on circa 140k per week?). That is the dilemma we are left with.

I understand people saying just trade our squad players. I have no problem with that and I would happily move on half a dozen squad players (for different reasons, mainly to allow a pathway for younger players but also to get rid of the ethos of failure). However we do have to be realistic in that it won't be easy to shift these lads on and we may end up making a loss on them (which defeats the object). The days when we could offload of squad players to poorer premier league teams is diminishing. All teams have lots of money and most would not be massively enthused about players such as Oviedo, Kone, Cleverley & Lennon. The money all the clubs have have opened doors to the foreign market. More foreign managers have also aided this process.

I see people plucking numbers for players we can sell, but there needs to be somebody willing to pay that figure otherwise it is irrelevant. We know somebody is willing to pay around 50 million for Stones so it becomes a concrete decision not one based in hopes or ambition.

I also appreciate some may look at some transfers and say Stones is undervalued. I would urge caution on this. Particularly in this window it is going to be crazy. There will always be examples of players going which will make Stones look cheap. There will also be players going that will make him look overpriced. Everyone will use Troy Deeney as their example. That's fair enough. However you can also get international Centre backs for half of the 50 million of what we'd get for Stones. I do think we shouldn't lose site of the end goal with Stones though, which is allowing us to trade more effectively.
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Good summary. I think the decision on Stones depends entirely on how radical a transfer window we aim to have. We can't know right now what Koeman and Moshiri intend - whether we recruit six top level players like you hypothesise or not - and it should only be when Koeman has fully assessed the squad that a decision is made re. Stones.

On top of the £7m allowance we have to remember that Osman, Pienaar, Howard and Hibbert have been released. A conservative estimate would have their collective salaries at around £7.5m (probably a bit more). The potential sales of 1-2 other players (a £5m sale of Cleverley, for example, isn't beyond imagination and would free up another £7m for wage increases) would be enough to make 3-4 top (~£100-140k per week) acquisitions.

It would be tight, but there's certainly a way of improving the squad significantly without selling Stones or Lukaku. Selling Stones only makes sense if, on top of Mata and Witsel, we sign another three or four players of comparable quality. It's debatable whether or not we require such a huge overhaul.
 
bluestevon said:
Interesting thought i had mate, with us having to pay Barnsley 15% of the profit we make - so around the 6.6-7.5m mark depending what figures you believe for a final sale price, what's the odds that we are going to try to sort a payment of equivalent value to Barnsley to wave their sell on clause ...

If we are selling to free up wage space within the STCC guidelines then i would think that it would make perfect sense for us to go about it that way

@The Esk , would that actually be legal and do you think it's something the club has actually been trying to sort out?
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I was thinking the other day that our friendly with them may well have something to do with the Stones sell-on. Maybe knock the percentage down a bit...
 
caught said:
Good summary. I think the decision on Stones depends entirely on how radical a transfer window we aim to have. We can't know right now what Koeman and Moshiri intend - whether we recruit six top level players like you hypothesise or not - and it should only be when Koeman has fully assessed the squad that a decision is made re. Stones.

On top of the £7m allowance we have to remember that Osman, Pienaar, Howard and Hibbert have been released. A conservative estimate would have their collective salaries at around £7.5m (probably a bit more). The potential sales of 1-2 other players (a £5m sale of Cleverley, for example, isn't beyond imagination and would free up another £7m for wage increases) would be enough to make 3-4 top (~£100-140k per week) acquisitions.

It would be tight, but there's certainly a way of improving the squad significantly without selling Stones or Lukaku. Selling Stones only makes sense if, on top of Mata and Witsel, we sign another three or four players of comparable quality. It's debatable whether or not we require such a huge overhaul.
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That's a great post.

I for one don't think we need a massive squad overhaul either - if we can get Rom to stay and Stones to stay, then bar a first choice keeper and back up striker we're pretty much set should the Mata and Witsel deals be all wrapped up.
 

bicycleheader said:
Think he meant ONE of our best players

For me he has the potential to be the best though

We wont win the treble we all crave if our centre back cant do cruyff turns and panenkas and swan out of the defence with the ball at his feet

Move with the times everybody
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he just said u dont sell your best player think he meant our best player. theres potential but hes not improving at all this year was a waste for stones we lost min 10 points because of stones fault
 
BlueToff said:
That's a great post.

I for one don't think we need a massive squad overhaul either - if we can get Rom to stay and Stones to stay, then bar a first choice keeper and back up striker we're pretty much set should the Mata and Witsel deals be all wrapped up.
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I'm of the same opinion regarding recruitment. Of course, selling Stones means we could go out and buy another three world class players in addition to Mata and Witsel but I'm not convinced it's necessary at the moment. Although Koeman has shown some skill in integrating new players for old at Southampton I'm still wary of trying to fit five or six summer buys into a team: it doesn't often seem to work.

Martinez had us performing below capability last season, and the squad is littered with unrealised potential. As you say, add a top class keeper and a forward capable of covering/challenging Lukaku to the Witsel and Mata signings and we have a good group. If Koeman thinks we need several more on top of that then maybe we sell Stones.
 
caught said:
Good summary. I think the decision on Stones depends entirely on how radical a transfer window we aim to have. We can't know right now what Koeman and Moshiri intend - whether we recruit six top level players like you hypothesise or not - and it should only be when Koeman has fully assessed the squad that a decision is made re. Stones.

On top of the £7m allowance we have to remember that Osman, Pienaar, Howard and Hibbert have been released. A conservative estimate would have their collective salaries at around £7.5m (probably a bit more). The potential sales of 1-2 other players (a £5m sale of Cleverley, for example, isn't beyond imagination and would free up another £7m for wage increases) would be enough to make 3-4 top (~£100-140k per week) acquisitions.

It would be tight, but there's certainly a way of improving the squad significantly without selling Stones or Lukaku. Selling Stones only makes sense if, on top of Mata and Witsel, we sign another three or four players of comparable quality. It's debatable whether or not we require such a huge overhaul.
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The problem i this lies in the figures mate though

Mata and Witsel - wages have been estimated at 140k pw each (14.56m combined)
Dowell and Davies signing contracts and Stekelenberg joining the three prob come in about 50k pw (2.6m)
Extension for Lukaku 75k going to 140k pw (3.38m)
Extension for Barkley 60k going to 110k pw (2.6m)
and if he sin't sold we'd need to extend Stones as well or risk losing him for nothing 30k going to 110k pw (4.68m)

27.82m increase in the wage bill from just those activities alone, going off your suggestions (7.5m available from the currently releasd players +7m annual allowed increase to wages by prem rules + 7m freed up from the sale of Cleverley (if we managed to get a buyer for that price) would see us allowed by the rules to increase it by 21m

we'd be in breach of the wages limitation rules by 6.82m already at that juncture...

Even assuming none of the academy lads receive contracts (highly unlikely to be the case) and that no other existing players will be pushing for improved contracts (Mori, Deulofeu, Coleman etc) - also highly unlikely we would need to find 6.82m reduction in wages further than what we already had managed at that point, and thats without even factoring in that at that point we would still need to bring in a starting keeper and a second striker at a bare minimum - for purpose of the example say Begovic arrives (currently on 80k pw at Chelsea and say Pelle - let's say 70k pw) thatd be another 7.8m wages on top of the 6.8m we are already over - meaning we'd now have to reduce the wage bill by another 14.8m in total or roughly 285k pw we'd need to shed in wages from the already trimmed down squad...


It just isn't a feasible thing for us to do mate, honestly we will need to sell Stones, the fact we are trying to get both Witsel and Mata in has already shown that we are selling him IMO.
 

bluestevon said:
The problem i this lies in the figures mate though

Mata and Witsel - wages have been estimated at 140k pw each (14.56m combined)
Dowell and Davies signing contracts and Stekelenberg joining the three prob come in about 50k pw (2.6m)
Extension for Lukaku 75k going to 140k pw (3.38m)
Extension for Barkley 60k going to 110k pw (2.6m)
and if he sin't sold we'd need to extend Stones as well or risk losing him for nothing 30k going to 110k pw (4.68m)

27.82m increase in the wage bill from just those activities alone, going off your suggestions (7.5m available from the currently releasd players +7m annual allowed increase to wages by prem rules + 7m freed up from the sale of Cleverley (if we managed to get a buyer for that price) would see us allowed by the rules to increase it by 21m

we'd be in breach of the wages limitation rules by 6.82m already at that juncture...

Even assuming none of the academy lads receive contracts (highly unlikely to be the case) and that no other existing players will be pushing for improved contracts (Mori, Deulofeu, Coleman etc) - also highly unlikely we would need to find 6.82m reduction in wages further than what we already had managed at that point, and thats without even factoring in that at that point we would still need to bring in a starting keeper and a second striker at a bare minimum - for purpose of the example say Begovic arrives (currently on 80k pw at Chelsea and say Pelle - let's say 70k pw) thatd be another 7.8m wages on top of the 6.8m we are already over - meaning we'd now have to reduce the wage bill by another 14.8m in total or roughly 285k pw we'd need to shed in wages from the already trimmed down squad...


It just isn't a feasible thing for us to do mate, honestly we will need to sell Stones, the fact we are trying to get both Witsel and Mata in has already showwn that we are selling him IMO.
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Or, someone work hard over the next 12 months and find 40m in sponsorship? There's a thought ;)
 
kithnou said:
Or, someone work hard over the next 12 months and find 40m in sponsorship? There's a thought ;)
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Most deals we appear to be tied into already that seems to be the issue, plus for due to starting at such a disadvantage right now over the likes of spurs, never mind the rs who are a similar distance ahead of spurs than spurs are ahead of us, and then the top 4 who are a mile ahead of everyone else, we need a kick-start mate

We do some dubious commercial deals now - effectively moshiri funding us through back channels, then this time next year we will plateua again because we will not have the ability to grow due to having padded and inflated commercial deals already.

We sell and pull level with spurs on wages through Player trading, then we can still substantially grow the subsequent years through commercial sponsorship growth

I'd love there to be a magic wand we could wave and it'd all fall in place without any price to be paid to get where we want - but end of the day, it is one good (potentially brilliant defender) being put as more important than the owners plans to grow us at a speed he wants if we don't sell right now
 
Nymzee said:
If you can get Bonucci for a penny less than Stones then I'd well go for it if I was Pep. Proven quality with years left in him.
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If they up the bid and sign Bonucci you can bet they wont be signing Stones.

Bonucci, Kompany ,Ottamendi ,Mangala & Di Michellis cant see Pep wanting any more .
 

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