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2021/2022 Rebuild


Neilwell86
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10 hours ago, supermarv said:

Also another 2 CBs on trial one being the ex Liverpool, West Ham player Mi’chel Parker and other someone mentioned a trialist from Luton (possibly on loan)

Any idea where Parker came from? He seems to have dropped off the radar completely around 2019.

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10 hours ago, fizoxy said:

You sure about the Luton guy? It was Dundee that had a guy on loan from there according to p&b.

The liverpool guy has barely played for anyone, cant imagine him being a starter.

Ah I’ve got mixed up didn’t even realise, we do have a London based player to come in on trial with a view to a loan hence why it made sense when I seen it.

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This is only tangential to the subject here but with all the talk of centre halfs on trial, I found myself wondering if these guys will be any better than the guy we had on loan from Blackburn. And it took me a good half hour to remember Tyler Magloire's name, despite his time with us being very recent.

Is it me getting old or is this a side effect of the fact that we never got to see him play in person? Will we all struggle to remember the likes of Calum Lang ever playing for us?

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A general story I know, but this news was on the BBC website this morning. I thought that when young players under 17, moved on any fee received was determined by strict and widely accepted compensation rules. Can they sign professional contracts before reaching 17? If so, United are up to their old tricks again of throwing money at young players. I know the source for this story is probably unreliable, but this seems to go against everything I thought to be true. Given the lad's age, 16, I would have thought that any development fee would be very modest. By comparison Allan Campbell was with us for a good number of years from an early age, left in his early 20s, played over a hundred first team games,  represented his country  and will probably earn us a development fee of about the same ie £400-500K. Are United at it again?

"Dundee United head coach Tam Courts believes the Scottish Premiership club are in a strong position over Kerr Smith's future despite Leicester City being keen to activate a clause in the 16-year-old's contract that would allow them to sign the centre-half for a reported fee of around £500,000."

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All in the detail I suppose. Whilst development fees shouldn’t be complex and follow a matrix, there are too many variables - clubs trading on future fees for example. The figure in question will be an optimum rather than an expected modest given his age in development terms.


Burrows was involved in media pieces yesterday  discussing a fear for future development as a fallout from Brexit where the bigger academies cannot hoover up talent from the continent - the focus is now on Scotland as our elite programmes bear fruit, where many clubs are now employing full time scouting staff.

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1 hour ago, Kmcalpin said:

A general story I know, but this news was on the BBC website this morning. I thought that when young players under 17, moved on any fee received was determined by strict and widely accepted compensation rules. Can they sign professional contracts before reaching 17? If so, United are up to their old tricks again of throwing money at young players. I know the source for this story is probably unreliable, but this seems to go against everything I thought to be true. Given the lad's age, 16, I would have thought that any development fee would be very modest. By comparison Allan Campbell was with us for a good number of years from an early age, left in his early 20s, played over a hundred first team games,  represented his country  and will probably earn us a development fee of about the same ie £400-500K. Are United at it again?

"Dundee United head coach Tam Courts believes the Scottish Premiership club are in a strong position over Kerr Smith's future despite Leicester City being keen to activate a clause in the 16-year-old's contract that would allow them to sign the centre-half for a reported fee of around £500,000."

I think there are several issues at play here and that makes it more complicated.

My understanding is that kids can sign a binding club contract from a very young age, maybe 9?, but that contract must be for no more than three years. That might be a legacy of the McLean years of exploiting kids by locking them in to excessive length of contract. However those youth contracts are not professional contracts which are only legal from age 17. So Kerr Smith could have had a legal non professional contract at Utd with various terms built in. Perhaps Utd wisely included a release figure way above the compensation rates as protection, but not really expecting that any Club would activate it given the amount. 

Compensation/development fees still apply for cross border transfers but Clubs are free to negotiate transfer terms which may be more beneficial than the prescribed calculations. Add-ons such as a % of future transfer fees are often seen as potentially more profitable than accepting a flat basic fee. Like we reportedly negotiated for Campbell and the youngster that joined Leeds a few years ago. The "cross border rule" is also a good reason why Utd might have inserted the release fee. To stop Clubs like Celtic, Rangers or Aberdeen poaching him and insisting that a Tribunal determine the compensation. Looking to the future and as OTF explains. taking Brexit into account there is a danger that the OF plus a few others may try and hoover up even more Scottish talent given that access to EU youngsters could be limited.

In short I think Utd have been quite clever in legally protecting their investment in Smith.

The 3 year maximum length of those youth contracts is something that is currently under close examination. It was suggested to the SFA during an ongoing Scottish Parliament enquiry into youth football that 3 years was excessive and should be reduced. Again the danger of any reduction further enabling the richer clubs to gather up all the talent was highlighted and so far no changes have been proposed. How to balance the investment made by clubs with the best interest of young players?

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17 hours ago, Neilwell86 said:

seeing a lot of Kevin van veen, Followed by the 'eye' emoji on twitter.

Seems to be more than a rumour, he's been at Fir Park for talks apparently,  GA keen to work with him again, the article is a week old but he is a free agent as of 1/7 so who knows

https://www.iron-bru.co.uk/exclusive-motherwell-join-race-for-kvv/

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7 minutes ago, Onthefringes said:

Was there due diligence carried out on the Head of Recruitment? Looks to be an easy gig…

On the basis we have signed very few players yet ?

On the basis we are being associated with certain players ?

I am quite sure he would have been vetted based on his previous experience and success rates.  Whether that makes him a success with us remains to be seen.

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Knew that would stir you.

Very few players is of no concern at this time.

Associated with certain players? I get the manager perhaps wanting to work with former charges, I’d expect the recruitment specialist to look beyond players that have been linked with him previously and those who’ve had a good 90 minutes against both.

Success rates? Tripping over those ringing endorsements. 

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58 minutes ago, Onthefringes said:

Knew that would stir you.

Very few players is of no concern at this time.

Associated with certain players? I get the manager perhaps wanting to work with former charges, I’d expect the recruitment specialist to look beyond players that have been linked with him previously and those who’ve had a good 90 minutes against both.

Success rates? Tripping over those ringing endorsements. 

Fair enough.  I agree FWIW.  I would hope that Head of Recruitment is able to look past his previous contacts and players that Alexander knows. 

That said part of the reason we no doubt appointed GA is because he would have an awareness of players that could possibly do a job for us in our budget.  So I would be more concerned were that not the case.

 

 

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2 hours ago, Welldaft Mk1 said:

That said part of the reason we no doubt appointed GA is because he would have an awareness of players that could possibly do a job for us in our budget.  So I would be more concerned were that not the case.

This is it for me. What's the point in bringing in a manager with experience in that level of English football if it's not to at least try to take advantage of his knowledge? I'd rather we brought in players that he considers to be of a certain type of character, and who have the ability to fit into his system than bring in unknowns.

The less risk we can take with a player, the better. 

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36 minutes ago, wellsince75 said:

Why would we look at a right back ?

WIth both S'OD and young Max Jonhstone - who 's a damn fine prospect I don't see the need.

 

Could SOD be away after his Euros stint? If so I don't know if someone with Zuk's experience would be the answer, but it would be one possibility as to why we were looking at right backs.

Would love to see Max get a bit of game time this season. I had always been of the impression that he was a left back primarily that could fill in at right back? Probably wrong on that one.

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42 minutes ago, Stu92 said:

Would love to see Max get a bit of game time this season. I had always been of the impression that he was a left back primarily that could fill in at right back? Probably wrong on that one.

He's only 17 but I agree - would love to see more game time.   Was thinking we could push S'OD further up and slot young Max to give him some cover.

Also creates a question over the likes of Grimshaw - is he still around ? 

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