freshie wrote:Ted Hughes wrote:freshie wrote:Ted Hughes wrote:I don't understand why we need Sterling to be world class. He's 20 years old & fast, can beat a man & scores the odd goal. He is effectively taking up a place in the squad which is currently empty, as Lampard is going. He's been possibly their outstanding player vs us. He's not a Sinclair type signing.
By all reports, City expect to have money to spend, irrespective of ffp. If he comes in & is just 'ok' we can move him on to at his peak & get a decent fee for him. If he's brilliant we have him for years or we sell him to Real Madrid for a bucket full of cash. It"s miles more than he's worth but so is every single fee we are being quoted. And we may get him for less anyway.
If it stops us from signing our biggest target then of course it's a mistake, but they wouldn't sign him under those circumstances. And our big targets are going to be chased by others, so we are not necessarily favourites.
If he's just 'ok' then we aren't going to recoup what we paid for him. Just because we have an incredibly rich owner doesn't mean that we should pay over the odds for players - does value for money not come into the equation? I just think that £50m is too much to spend on a largely unproven player with a questionable off the field track record. We paid £38m for Aguero who was a much better player at the time then Sterling is now - I find it hard to justify the £50m fee that is being quoted and wouldn't want us to pay more than £30m for him. Let's not forget that he has only had one good season. You say that you don't understand why he has to be world class - that's fine as long as we don't pay the sort of money that is spent on world class players. I think that we are only favourites to sign him because nobody else is going to pay the amount of money that Liverpool want for him
Pogba isn't world class.
We either sign nobody or pay over the odds. Sterling's record in the Premier League is way ahead of Pogba's.
Although I didn't mention Pogba, I agree he isn't world class and the £70-80m fees being quoted for him are obscene
I agree the numbers being banded about are stupid, but I think he is a player that would come into our team and improve us, that is the minimum we should be aiming for, IMO Pogba is a brilliant player and one that will dominate midfield for a long time.