An Aggressive Transfer Policy: Cadres Are All-Important |
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| 13.01.2008 18:06 |
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This article is dedicated to the bases of the transfer policy of the club. It also suggests a conception of aggressive transfer policy by means of installment.Before buying new players it is necessary to size up the current squad of the club in order to determine the players for sale and the ones who should be offered a new contract. It is very important to offer new contracts in the very beginning of the season, so I want you to put your attention on this point. The thing is that in the very beginning of your career you can prolong the contract with almost any player that has his contract coming to the end, but you may find it quite difficult to do after a month of your work in the club. I also suggest that you offer new contracts to a couple of key players that the “big clubs” may take a tender interest in. It will help you not to have sad players in the club if you refuse to sell them. It is also one of the ways of struggling with the Board that sells players whenever they want to. Just put the asking price at face value or even lower and reject all the offers-for-sale. A player that will sign a new deal will be happy for almost all the rest of the season. The next point is the sale of players. It is the most important and the most difficult thing as well. But your buying campaign is depended on this point. As we’ve noticed to sell a player is a much more difficult task than to buy one. First of all you should determine the players that you will no doubt sell, then the ones that you won’t sell under no circumstances, and finally you should determine the players that you may sell for a reasonable price. The ones you want to sell you should put on the transfer list with the squad status “not needed by the club” and offer them to the clubs at face value or at a little bigger price. If several clubs have shown interest in the player and the price suits them down to the ground than you may play a little and raise the price, but the most important is not to overplay here. N.B. An installment selling of a player for 12 months will increase the number of potential buyers. An installment selling for more than 12 months is as welcome as snow in harvest because it will reduce your transfer budget. No doubt cash is preferable if it doesn’t tell on the selling price. If there was no interest shown in the player don’t give up. There are two options. You may reduce the price till the buyer is shown up. Or you may wait a little, let the player play in several matches and offer him to the clubs again. If you fail to sell the player after trying the two options you may still offer the player on loan this way you will reduce the maintenance costs and the player will have the opportunity to arouse interest in him. Take your time and don’t sell a young player on a cut price cause’ he may rise in price. But if you want to sell a player in his late twentieth (over 28 years) than you should act quickly cause’ it’s quite difficult to sell a player over 30 years at a high price. A small but an important feature: you should keep an eye on the transfers of the club that showed interest in your player but hasn’t made an offer yet. There is a chance that the club having sold a player will be ready to buy your player even at a bigger price. You should price out as far as the players that you may sell at a reasonable price are concerned but you should mention the installment point for 12 months it will save you from the Board’s exposure. Cause if you charge an exorbitant price of 20 millions pounds in cash you may receive an offer of 7 millions and most often the Board will agree the offer but it won’t happen if you receive a hire-purchase offer. In the current patched version of Football Manager it’s difficult to sell a player for more than 30 millions if the player is not Cristiano Ronaldo or Kaká of course, which is more realistic so think twice before inflating prices. Now let’s turn to the most pleasant and important thing – the purchase of players. First of all you should make a shortlist of players that you want to see in your team. It will help you to watch the players that you want to buy and it will also show you the best opportunity to buy the players. But note that the player’s price may change greatly during the month without any visible cause. The price may happen to change during a week and you’ll be a lucky man if you manage to seize the moment. So if you don’t use the programs as mini scout and something of the kind I suggest that you send a scout to renew the information of the player or just make a bid a couple of times a month which is more useful. As far as visible causes are concerned first of all we should consider the mood of the player. If the player is sad sooner or later it will tell on his sale price. You can provoke the player who is eager to play in your club to be unhappy by means of making a bid that will be rejected. The price may also change after the close of the transfer window or after a certain number of games when you see that the player doesn’t get first team football even after being shown a public interest in him. Ask the assistant to filter out unrealistic targets this way you’ll see the changes and you won’t waste you time on the players that don’t want to join your team. Now, when you’ve found the proper player and managed to seize the moment for the purchase we should talk of the term “aggressive transfer policy”, which is the instalment. Buying a player in instalment for 24 months may increase your transfer budget enormously. How does it work? When you pay 5 millions for the player in cash the transfer budget will decrease for 5 millions. But when you pay the same 5 million in instalment you will have your transfer budget decreased for only 2.5 millions. So 24 months instalment will reduce the transfer budget only for 50 % it means that you can buy twice as many players. One more advantage is that there is no big cash outflow when you buy a player. It means that when you are out of your transfer budget and you reduce the salary budget in favour of transfer budget you may ask the board to increase your transfer budget and your request will be accepted. Why should they reject your request if the club has money? You may spend the money and then ask the board to increase the salary budget if the board rejects your request than you may ask the board to increase the transfer budget. And there is a good chance that your request will be accepted if you didn’t ask for something more (to expand the stadium or to improve training facilities) and if you didn’t bother the board too often with your requests. So if you leave something for the period after the close of transfer window then you’ll enjoy the new opportunities. I mean you may buy players in instalment without prejudice to your budget if the price is within the limits of your transfer budget of course. The transfer budget will be adjusted after the player’s arrival. So this way you may buy as many players as you like until your salary budget is reduced of course. (Somehow the salary budget is adjusted in some secret way). There is only one big disadvantage in this scheme. You may buy much more players than you can keep. (When I was playing for Sevilla I bought players for 200 millions pounds within two seasons). You should control the expenses yourself which is fraught with negative balance reaching the end of the season. Negative balance means that you won’t be able neither to improve your training facilities nor to expand the stadium, you’ll have some troubles with salary funds and thereafter you’ll experience some troubles with prolonging the contracts. The board will accept almost any offer to purchase the player. So if you fail to win something you’ll be in for tough times, especially if you repeat your tricks the following season. The conversion of your debts and replacement of the owners may help here but the threat of being faced with bankruptcy will prevent you from working in a fruitful and easy way. So taking this way you should be wise in your spending. P.S. Some small but useful ruses. When you sign a player try not to add any bonuses and reduce the salary if you don’t struggle against other clubs for the player and you don’t badly need him in your team of course. If there is some other club that shows interest in the player you want to buy and you don’t have enough funds to buy him you should offer to the player the best possible contract. You should delay the transfer for the maximum possible two weeks until the deal is cancelled. During this time clubs may lose their interest in the player. Discuss this article! |