The Official Summer Transfer Window 2025/26 Season

[Rock strongo 143 73]

"I still support the decision to go to Middlesbrough. The city may not be the most beautiful in England and I don't like fish and chips. But it has been good for my development, because I have played a lot.

My brother Sepp took a different path by transferring to Liverpool, a big club. But he has done very well in a roundabout way, he now plays almost everything at Brentford. That is also important to me and decisive in a choice, I want playing time. I did tell my agent that he should only call if a club is very serious. Did he call after that? Yes. But I can't say anything more about it."

Is that such a bad thing to say? It’s a bit tongue and cheek but nothing offensive 

[Bosco's Tuft 1,269 1.3k]

33 minutes ago, TeaCider24 said:

If you're going to wheeler deal, he's the one valuable player in the squad that I think we could comfortably justify selling.

wheeler deal 🙂

I hope we're not planning to use the money on a fleet of old bangers.

[estonpidge 1,837 6.5k]

Obviously Tav & Rogers sell-on money would be nice but with the sale of ELL, Hackney & Azaz for hopefully £60-70m in total, that should be enough to spend reasonably well on all replacements without going into silly money.

[Humpty 5,128 10.5k]

There's a little bit of the Jobe Bellingham situation with RVDB. He's shown glimpses of potential but certainly not enough to really justify the interest and price tag that's being banded about. There's no doubt in my mind more doors have opened for him because of his brothers name.

[Redcar Rioja 9,019 8.8k]

2 minutes ago, Rock strongo said:

"I still support the decision to go to Middlesbrough. The city may not be the most beautiful in England and I don't like fish and chips. But it has been good for my development, because I have played a lot.

My brother Sepp took a different path by transferring to Liverpool, a big club. But he has done very well in a roundabout way, he now plays almost everything at Brentford. That is also important to me and decisive in a choice, I want playing time. I did tell my agent that he should only call if a club is very serious. Did he call after that? Yes. But I can't say anything more about it."

Is that such a bad thing to say? It’s a bit tongue and cheek but nothing offensive 

Add in that he's a young lad who is either not speaking in his native language or it has been translated and is perhaps not exactly what/how things were meant.

 

That said there isn't anything there that's bad or couldn't be explained away within reason.

[Rock strongo 143 73]

1 minute ago, Redcar Rioja said:

Add in that he's a young lad who is either not speaking in his native language or it has been translated and is perhaps not exactly what/how things were meant.

 

That said there isn't anything there that's bad or couldn't be explained away within reason.

I remember when we played Herenveen pre season. I spoke to some Dutch fans and they said very similar but they didn’t mean any offence by it. Just came across quite forthright by our standards 

[Denzel Zanzibar 8,120 15.5k]

Bloody Dutch people, eh

I've worked with Dutch students when at Uni and just like Germans, they're very forthright and often come across as being offensive even though they're just being honest

[Humpty 5,128 10.5k]

He's free to say whatever he likes but i don't think it's great timing given some of his arrogant shows of petulance last season and his below par performances. 

[Redcar Rioja 9,019 8.8k]

5 minutes ago, Rock strongo said:

I remember when we played Herenveen pre season. I spoke to some Dutch fans and they said very similar but they didn’t mean any offence by it. Just came across quite forthright by our standards 

Dutch and Germans can seem quite blunt and forceful when they speak English at times. it's unintentional.

I'm not sure about Dutch but I know in German they phrase things in a slightly different way to us which is traditional for them but it can sound direct and rude to us.

They tend to put the reason for the sentence at the start and the fluffy bit afterwards while we build up to the reason/topic in a more subtle manner.

 

[SouthernSmoggie 5,276 7k]

I don't think he's being rude. But the point stands that he's not exactly pulling up trees here - I doubt many fans of other Championship clubs know who he is. I guess a Premier League club may buy him based on potential, but there are probably plenty of young defenders out there with potential. 

[Bruce 3,087 2.4k]

1 hour ago, Neverbefore said:

I do find it wild, article aside, that people are so down on rav. He didn't have a great season, but it also wasn't terrible. Few niggly injuries and a couple of off games but I dont think any of our other CBs were any better, the team as a whole struggled in that area of the pitch. 

But also... he's literally 20 years old still. Most players haven't broken into the first team regularly at that age never mind been a number 1 choice cb for 2 years. I dont see why he's being held to such a high standard already- he's only going to get better and I want that to be with us. 

27 minutes ago, Humpty said:

There's a little bit of the Jobe Bellingham situation with RVDB. He's shown glimpses of potential but certainly not enough to really justify the interest and price tag that's being banded about. There's no doubt in my mind more doors have opened for him because of his brothers name.

With the exception of Hackney none of our* players had a good season last season and even Hackney had a tricky spell before Christmas. When all your players are playing badly at the same time, you know the problem is systemic rather than individual. 

As Humpty says, Rav has a name premium like Bellingham and I'm pretty sure that several top tier clubs will test the water. He's still only 20, (21 in July) so they'll be thinking if they can get him relatively cheap this summer he has a lot more room to increase in value. From Rav's point of view, if he gets the right offer he pretty much has to go to progress his career. From our point of view, we ought to be building next seasons team around him, Morris and Conway** and that means doubling his wages with a new contract offer (assuming we can) and letting him know we won't stand in his way if he wants to leave at the end of the season. Obviously he might stagnate or go backwards and we miss out on a hefty profit but at some point you have to make a bet on who you think will be your elite players and do what it takes to keep them.

 

*Doak and Travers had good seasons but weren't our players. Azaz had an excellent season on paper but more mixed in the real world.

**Assuming Hackney leaves.

[Lichfieldred 31 51]

On 11/28/2023 at 6:33 PM, Redcar Rioja said:

In that case I think we would get top bottom end Premiership dollar for him, circa £12M plus add ons, maybe £15M plus add ons at a push.

we wont sell for that, we should demand a club record sale otherwise he stays

 

[Lord_Moose 587 1.1k]

I don’t really see a great deal of offence in what he says about the area so I’m not too bothered about that. I’d rather him say he’s hoping to move than have the circus we did with ELL’s agent.

He was always signed with us as a stepping stone which suited us fine; he got to play games and we largely got good performances out of him and should make some decent money. If we get a good offer for him then he’ll be off, especially if he is unwilling to sign a new contract. Sales of him and Hackney could really help build out the squad for the new manager. You’d think his value will start to dip once the transfer window closes so we’d be better placed to cash in now.

[Blanco 5,613 7.2k]

Just now, Lord_Moose said:

I don’t really see a great deal of offence in what he says about the area so I’m not too bothered about that. I’d rather him say he’s hoping to move than have the circus we did with ELL’s agent.

He was always signed with us as a stepping stone which suited us fine; he got to play games and we largely got good performances out of him and should make some decent money. If we get a good offer for him then he’ll be off, especially if he is unwilling to sign a new contract. Sales of him and Hackney could really help build out the squad for the new manager. You’d think his value will start to dip once the transfer window closes so we’d be better placed to cash in now.

Should probably wait and see if he has a good U21 tournament at the Euros before selling. That could add a few quid to the pot.

[BelgianBoro 991 744]

2 hours ago, Borodane said:

Funny he's mentioning the food considering he's grown up in a country that arguably have the worst kitchen in europe. I don't think I've been to country with worse or more boring food than Holland and Belgium. It's downright horrific.

OK for Holland but have you seen the number of sauces we have in Belgium for your chips? 
and Denmark, do you guys have a cuisine? 😉