Originally published at: Snubbed again: Celtic must make loan approach for Ben Davies this summer - 67 Hail Hail
Ben Davies is unlikely to have any regrets about choosing to sign for Liverpool instead of Celtic in the winter transfer window, despite a difficult start at Anfield. Davies was hours away from completing a pre-contract agreement with Celtic as deadline day approached, only to be blown out of the water by Jurgen Klopp’s side.…
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If we do go for a loan we should have a loan to buy clause. I’m tied of the short term thinking. I know loans have their place but I think Celtic had been loaning to many players to their long term detriment.
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He’s not injured is he? Could this be a red flag about his abilities?
@StrangeAttractions @john.mcginley I’m going to a stab at the whole Ben Davis affair, as from the get-go I believe that Liverpool through Klopp’s connections with Slippy-G deliberately done us up like a kipper when Liverpool pipped in at the last minute to snatch Davies away from us in order to Help Slippy-G out. Correct me If I’m wrong but Liverpool were badly in need of centre-back to fill in for the injured Van Dijk but from the minute Ben Davis stepped though the door at Anfield has he yet to feature for them?
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Liverpool are STILL badly in need of a CB but won’t play Davies.
My imagined worst case scenario would be that Liverpool loan or sell Davies to theRangers next season.
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I wouldn’t say it’s a red flag. The whole Liverpool squad is in shambles and I think Klopp is trying to form some sort of partnership (and forage stability) between Kabak and Fabinho.
Davies looks more and more like a pure panic buy to me. I still think he’s a very capable player and could certainly do a fine job for Celtic.
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That’s a bit of a relief to hear. I haven’t watched much Championship football so I’m going off highlights (which are, as the name suggests, impressive) so I don’t know his quality. Looks a player and we could keep him for 4 or 5 years as an Ajer replacement. I imagine he’s on a (comparative) fortune at Liverpool and would take a pay cut to play at Celtic.
@Ryan Hummmm, I don’t know fello Celt, we all know that Slippy-G is close with Klopp, its well known that Slippy has kept in regular contact with him throughout his time at Sevco for advice on management and tactics. The money that Liverpool have they could have had their pick of many a decent centre-back from the lower teams or the EFL divisions but in the year that we handed Sevco the title, Liverpool jump in last minute and snatch Davies away from us, only to bin him, to try and forge a partnership between Kabak and Fabinho? Reeks of shady dealing to me. If Klopp (as he’s proving) had it in mind that he was going with and working on a Kabak and Fabinho centre-back pairing, then why even bother going after Davies at all.
I don’t think it runs that deep. I think they were desperate for a CB, saw the deal that Celtic had in the works and swooped in with a little more muscle and flash than Celtic have at their disposal.
I don’t think Klopp operates in that fashion. He’s never made an effort to raid Dortmund or to ship unwanted players off to them in his time at Liverpool and I’d say he’s much closer with them than he is with Gerrard. Same with when his mate Wagner was at Schalke- they made a move to try and get Kabak then and it didn’t pan out.
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I watched a few odds and ends of Preston matches when he was starting to be linked and I liked him! I think the highlights do him justice. My concern would be that he’d want to stay in the Prem and would end up at a more “traditional” mid-table club.
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Fellow celt I think Jurgen was chairman of the Stuttgart true blues RSC growing up and since he came to work in liverpool he joined the lol. I think that’s a conspiracy theory so far fetched that rangers fans would be falling off their chairs laughing.
Something didn’t sit right with me regarding the Ben Davies deal…just seemed so random of Liverpool.
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I think it comes down to their ownership. They don’t want to put up any more cash. Look at how they run the Boston Red Sox- they traded away one of the most talented players in all of baseball because they didn’t want to pay him what it would take to extend his contract and I think this was a pretty similar situation- they already paid up for Van Dijk and were looking for bargains as a stop-gap. The Davies deal was already out there & they were running out of time after their situation got even worse when Matip went down.
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I could see him following this model. It’s certainly financially lucrative. No glory in it though.
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I’m interested to hear your thoughts fello Celt, what aspects of the Davies to Liverpool deal don’t sit right with you? Do you think there’s a possibility that he’ll end up at Rangers next year on a cut-price deal, as has been suggested on here (which is definitely food for thought)? After all, it was well known that Sevco were also expressing an interest at the same time we were and Slippy-G was keen on the lad.
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@Ryan I’m sure this could be a thread in of itself but your observation is very interesting Fello Celt, what’s your thoughts on all these American owners of English clubs popping up out of the woodwork ever since the MLS was reinvented and restarted? Do you think the Americas are trying to corner the footballing market by heavily investing in or outright buying up footballing clubs? Would America ownership of football clubs throughout Europe be a good our bad thing?
AC MILAN: U.S. Hedge fund Elliott Management
MANCHESTER UNITED: American Glazer family
LIVERPOOL: US Fenway Sports Group
ARSENAL: Owned by American billionaire and sports entrepreneur Stan Kroenke
PARMA: Owned by American billionaire Kyle Krause
ROMA: Owned by American businessman and film director Dan Friedkin
SOUTHAMPTON: American Joseph DaGrosa is in the process of buying out the club
BORDEAUX: Owned by American Joseph DaGrosa
MARSEILLE: Owned by American Frank McCourt
CRYSTAL PALACE: Owned by Americans Josh Harris and David Blitzer
It feels to me that a lot of these American owners view the clubs they buy as assets rather than something their passionate about. I think that can be said about a lot of foreign ownership, to be fair. I don’t think it’s about cornering a market necessarily, but about tapping into a vast revenue stream.
I think we’ve seen that create situations where ownership that comes in and is not connected to the club in any way will stray from the club’s identity and ethos that the fans hold dear. Recent examples that come to mind are Liverpool deciding to (or attempting to) furlough club and stadium employees and Cardiff changing their kit from blue to red for a period of time. I think it may be a little cliché to say that it endangers the “soul” of football, but I think it really does. That being said, it’s a product of the world we live in and clubs are increasingly unapologetic about it. Guardiola flat out stayed the other day that City are good because they have lots of money to buy players. We’re entirely viewed as customers and not supporters these days.
I’m definitely an advocate for clubs being fan owned. Save for a few tricky dealings here and there (RB Leipzig and Hoffenheim come to mind) I think German football is a great benchmark for the top leagues with their 50%+1 fan ownership model. That doesn’t exempt you from the colossuses that are Bayern and Dortmund, but it also allows for the likes of FC St. Pauli and Union Berlin (currently in 7th in the top flight! A massive achievement) to essentially exist as they do because of their supporters. I’m sure we’re all a little more familiar with St.Pauli, but there are a few excellent short documentaries about both clubs and the supporter community that allow them to exist on YouTube.
After taking the long way around to answer your question, I’m always dubious of foreign ownership. Clubs should only be an asset to their supporters and their communities.
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A very thought-provoking observation fello Celt and I’m 100% with you on the fan ownership idea, as you say, the Germans have the right approach, therefore, looking into the future, it could be down to the supporters of every club from around the globe but especially within Europe to come together and SAVE their footballing clubs from the dangerous clutches of the American styled approach of ‘Over Commercialization’ management, a strategy which is ultimately designed and put in place to bleed the fans and the club dry to fill the pockets of their rich owners, which respectively places those clubs in danger (if the ■■■■ hits the fan) of going bankrupt.
I always knew that from the very moment that the ‘Murdoch Family’ through their SKY empire bought into the working-class man’s game of football with the old English first division, that somewhere down the line, football within Europe would be styled to operate (to an extent) much like the NFL (without the drafting of players) as in, it would be ‘Commercialised’ to death, commercialised to the possible death of many a club, in the smaller leagues within Europe, clubs that reside within the smaller leagues of Scotland, Portugal, Holland and the Nordic countries were always due to suffer and over the last two decades we’ve seen that happened with regards to the ‘Champions League’, a league that took Roman Abramovich ( owner of Chelsea F.C) to spend over a billion pounds to win the competition back in 2012.
The American styled management strategy of ‘Over Commercialization’ of football within Europe has led to clubs seeking ludicrous transfer compensation prices for bang-average players, players seeking ridiculous wage packages, that don’t (no matter how good they are), in any way justifies them joining any club. In order to compensate the selling clubs and incoming greedy, self-entitled players, clubs (to successfully compete in Europe as well as on the domestic front) have to raise the price of season tickets and merchandise to silly levels that could put the working-class fan and their family into financial hardship just to support their club, in order to compensate the greedy selling club(s) and the greedy self-entitled player(s). If UEFA doesn’t get a grip on this European club football could self-imploded
Roman Abramovich, owner of English Premier League football club Chelsea, donated 74 million pounds ($100m) to an Israeli settler group that displaces Palestinians from occupied East Jerusalem, an investigation by BBC Arabic found
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It’s all so disheartening. I agree, every part of our support is being exploited for profit. Remember when kits lasted for more than a season and when you didn’t have to do some serious financial planning to figure out what streaming services to subscribe to in order to watch your club?
I live in Canada and the Bundesliga is the only men’s football shown on cable television outside of the MLS, everything else is a subscription service & it wasn’t like this before! I remember bolting home on my lunch breaks from school to watch footy on television as a kid, it’s a shame that’s out of reach for some now.
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Aye! The kits lasting more than a season blows my mind.
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