The old Man Utd Thread

[Dark Soldier]

Best club in the world lads.

[Commander Jameson]

Sounds like there are all sorts of Twitter rumours going on about this transfer. Could be on again now. Some mix-up with the document formats?

[Bleeders]

At least we're doing our best to make Deadline Day fun I guess.

[Willow]

I've got a mental image of Ed on the phone like you would to a grandparent "right click the file. don't double click it. RIGHT click it and it should give you some options"

[humdrum]

Maybe the Spanish fa's trial copy of winzip expired?

[Bleeders]

What on earth are they using at LFP? WordPerfect?

[humdrum]

I bet it was sent as a .docx format and the Spanish FA haven't updated there copy of office 2003 so had to download the conversion plugin.

[humdrum]

https://twitter.com/realmadrid/status/41614946857000960

[ckny]

I genuinely think the way Man Utd are acting in the transfer market since Ferguson has left is damaging the reputation of the league. I'd be livid if I was a Man Utd fan today, even if Monaco have produced and sold Thierry Henry2.

This. I'm so fucking pissed off at this amateur hour bullshit. Dragging the reputation of the club through the dirt. We're a laughing stock, a play thing for the true mega powers.

[ckny]

Why are we unable to command decent fees for our players? Evans is off to West Brom for £6m, the same club who paid double that for James Chester!

Following on from this - Borini is worth more than Chicharito now.

[Gabe]

Whilst funny, this transfer makes you look inept at best. The transfer has been happening for ages and it was announced at, what, about 6pm? The paperwork should have been on standby, ready for go-time.

If Madrid don't get the extension, you have to wonder how messed-up DDG's head will be. Surely he'll be massively pissed at your board? Guess it also means you'll get nothing for him as he'll just sign a pre-contract in January to boot.

It's all a bit of a pickle, that's for sure

[angel]

blatter would have this sorted with a couple of text messages and a manila envelope

[toythatkills]

I hope you did this on purpose to show Real they can't mess you around. I'd take back everything I said.

[Bleeders]

Real were 28 minutes late submitting the documents that they've had all Summer to do. Serves em' right really.

[Bluejam]

http://abload.de/img/ddgxkr35.gif

[feltmonkey]

It's gone very quiet regarding the Martial deal. Is it all going to go De Gea?

[Rev]

It's gone very quiet regarding the Martial deal. Is it all going to go De Gea?

Sadly for neutrals everywhere, it is confirmed.

[feltmonkey]

Literally three minutes after I posted getting worried.

I wouldn't worry, Rev. There's 40 minutes left, which is plenty of time for one of United's trademark massive deadline day fuck-ups. We'll probably sign Jon Walters for £100m or something, then accidentally shred the money instead of giving it to Stoke, before Ed Woodward runs himself over in the car park.

[Rev]

There's every chance Ed was reading rllmuk and your post reminded him.

[Gabe]

I wonder what happens now then. Presumably Madrid will get him for free now next season? Will United try and hawk him around in January to try and get some money for him? Will he be eternally annoyed and refuse to play (potentially known as a 'Berahino')? Will he come back into the fold and have a great season, or will every flap at a cross or mistake be evidence that he's stopped trying?

If he does go for a free, I'm not sure who is really happy with that.

[feltmonkey]

De Gea not playing again, and ending up going on a free next season is literally the worst scenario for everyone. Hopefully both De Gea and the club will realise this.

[Majora]

GK and striking positions are a mess. We've either got someone who doesn't want to be at the club or an accident waiting to happen at GK. And we've got a slow, waning captain or a pretty much unheard of teenager as striker. Sigh.

[humdrum]

No chance that De Gea might blame Real for the fuck up and want to stay?

[Gabe]

No chance that De Gea might blame Real for the fuck up and want to stay?

I think Madrid have covered that aspect by confirming that United only wanted to deal on the last day for them, and then it was 6 or 7 hours before they sent stuff over. Yes, Madrid allegedly were late too, but you'd still say they should have opened negotiations sooner.

It's such a farce I'm wondering if this was Madrid's plan all along (as ridiculous as that sounds) - or, at least, they seemingly aren't that fussed - so they could get him without paying Man U a penny, just to massively troll them. After all, they are the team that will likely be losing their best player and will now have to find a replacement separate to that. Unless they don't register DDG for the Champions League, which would make him a more attractive proposition to buy in January.

It's all rather intriguing, watching from the outside.

[boxoctosis]

Statement from Man U on all of this pish. Gives a different take, unsurprisingly.

http://www.manutd.com/en/News-And-Features/Football-News/2015/Sep/manchester-united-statement-in-response-to-real-madrid-comments-on-david-de-gea-transfer.aspx?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=post&utm_campaign=ManUtd

[DC Lemon]

Manchester United acts appropriately and efficiently in its transfer dealings.

And it doesn't get more efficient than paying £36m for an unknown teenager.

[Majora]

The club is delighted that its fan-favourite double Player of the Year, David de Gea, remains a Manchester United player.

Thats a weird thing to say.

We're delighted he remains a Manchester United player (even though he can't wait to leave and the only reason he's still here is because of bureaucracy and oh god what are we meant to do with him now?)

[Liamness]

Worth reading Sid Lowe's take on the whole thing. Neither club come up smelling of roses, but it sounds like Madrid were essentially expecting United to reopen negotiations after they hit a stalemate, which of course we would have no reason to do. It still should have been possible for the transfer to go through on the last day though, incompetence must have played a part as much as tardiness. When you consider that these are two clubs that have had plenty of dealings with each other over the years, it should have been really simple.

I am looking forward to seeing David de Gea back in between the sticks, even if it's only till the end of the season. He has a nice signing on bonus waiting for him when he does eventually sign for Madrid, I suppose.

[Rev]

As much as it would be massively nose-off-face-spite I'm not 100% they'll go for him. This transfer has made them look very silly and they don't like that at all.

But hey, fan-favourite.

[feltmonkey]

I wonder what happened. As Sid Lowe points out, Madrid's excuses don't really hold water. They moan that United didn't open negotiations until Monday, but that makes no sense. Were they expecting United to come to them, begging them to buy our player of the year? It was up to them to make an offer. United's statement just says no offer was received from Madrid until Monday. There's some weird double-speak in the Madrid statement,

2 Despite the difficulties involved in completing an operation of this nature on the last day of registration, Madrid agreed to open those conversations.

Again, this seems to imply that United were coming to them to try and sell De Gea, rather than the other way around, and that they were somehow doing us a favour by buying him. A very strange quote.

They then complain about the eight-hour delay to United sending the contracts back, presumably agreeing the deal. This still gave them two and a half hours to finish the details off, and register the transfer.

Then both clubs seem to agree that Madrid sent the contracts back to United at about 11.30 Spanish time. United's statement mentions that Madrid failed to send the signatory page, and that minutes later, with only twenty minutes to the deadline, Madrid tried to significantly change the terms of the deal. Madrid do not mention this. This seems to be quite a key point. I wonder what the changes were. Were Madrid playing last-minute silly-buggers? Are United over-stating the significance of minor changes?

Then there was apparently a flurry of last-minute activity. Navas only agreed terms at 11.53, Madrid only sent the documents required for United to terminate De Gea's contract at 11.55, United entered the details into TMS at 12.00, right on the deadline, and for some reason Madrid appear to have been waiting for United to do this. As Sid Lowe points out, they do not need to wait! The Madrid statement is disingenuous in that it again implies that they had to wait before entering this. They also ascribe significance to the fact that the Navas deal was not entered, but of course it didn't need to be - the deadline on transfers of players heading to England did not close until 6pm today.

The penultimate point about being "invited" to register De Gea by an automated system is odd, but seems to be just a way of heading off those reports of them being 28 minutes late rather than 2 minutes late. "We knew we were too late, honest, but the machine still wanted us to send us the documents, so we did so to be polite."

The final statement, about them "doing everything" to complete the signing is pretty tragic. It's like a naughty child making excuses. "So, as you can see, it wasn't my fault," The whole statement is an attempt to placate fans who will no doubt be livid, and shift the blame onto United. Their reasons why it's all United's fault don't really hold water, though. The eight-hour delay is the only thing they have, but really there was still enough time to sort things out if they had worked efficiently, co-operatively, and competently. Their statement is disingenuous and filled with spin, but then what else can you expect from Real? The bottom line as far as I can make out would appear to be that Madrid fucked-up.