General question for everyone. Do you think the prices are going down any time soon for players? Or are we more likely looking at a steady rise if anything?
Transfer fees showing no signs of slowing down so far.
It’s so pathetic.
People wonder why there’s inflation, and you look at these fees.
The rich are getting richer and feasting on record profits to spend on bullshit like transfer fees.
While we are getting fucked in every which way
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No, for two reasons.
First, transfer fees have never really gone down significantly. People always say the bubble will burst and it never does.
Second, there is still a lot of revenue potential to unlock in football and the sport is governed so corruptly and incompetently at every level that it seems unlikely anybody will stand in the way of clubs ultimately just maximizing their business.
There are huge differences, especially the franchise model in a closed league, but American sports have nowhere near the same global appeal yet the teams are worth much more - the Washington Commanders, a mediocre NFL team (albeit with a storied history), just sold for roughly what Manchester United will sell for - and you have lots of star players in MLB, NFL, NBA making the equivalent of £600k-800k per week. Even beyond the state owned clubs, owners like Boehly and Kroenke aren’t going to blink at spending 2-300m in transfer fees over a summer when they just gave a 300m/7 year contract to one baseball player, as long as they can see a path to greater profitability in the future due to some combination of Super League, Club World Cup, individual team streaming rights, etc.
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I really don’t give a shit if he signs or not. Good player, not a generational talent, not a 100m player, there are other fish in the sea. If he signs, that’s great, but I don’t really care if he doesn’t. The club will find someone else.
That said, I understand why some people are invested emotionally in the transfer. It’s a “statement signing”, it’s a guy tagged to be the next England captain which might mean something to people and people may think he’s on the cusp of becoming a generational talent so the idea that we have a midfielder locked in for the next five years to solidify this core is appealing. I just can’t really get too hyped about him for whatever reason.
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@Powderfinger gave a great answer for this.
To add slightly to it–the TV rights continue to drive the money higher and the fees higher. The US TV rights for the PL were just renewed to a similar level for the UK’s. I think that it will continue to grow and wouldn’t be surprised if the US TV rights are a higher cost than the UK ones at the next contract renewal. Throw in the even bigger potential in the Asian and African TV markets and I do not think that the money will be “less” anytime soon. The PL clubs certainly aren’t slowing down the money making pre-season tours to the US and other countries either.
As a side note, the convoluted rules around games for TV in England is a bit of a curiosity and seem to be from a bygone era.
Agree on all of this. Not sure about the sideways n backwards bit as he does seem to drive forward with the ball, but the rest is my view too.
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I’m too invested now. Would be gutted if we don’t land him and he signs for City.
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Latest update is that Richard Garlick is having a stinker in the toilet.
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Hope he was having a wank. That means this transfer is wrapped.
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After 729 post on this thread since I last checked in we still haven’t signed him 
I don’t get it.
why we will not bid the 4th time?
We won’t have to, Sullivan is playing to the gallery. The 3rd bid has seemingly been the favourite since before we put the 1st one on the table.
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Where is Dobbie in all of this? Did they kill him?
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Got sent to Azkaban where he belongs
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You’ve just killed Dobbo’s name, if anything.
Dobbie was that weird one out of Peep Show.
https://twitter.com/Dobbo0107/status/1673378550102085632?s=20
https://twitter.com/Dobbo0107/status/1673377895715160065?s=20
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Debbie?!?!
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does it mean if we don’t bid, City won’t bid?
just assholes… don’t even want to place their own bid themselves…
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This pissed me off as well. Waiting for our bid to be accepted so that they bid more. Such a dick move.
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