photo by Marc Atkins/ISIphotos.com
By FRANCO PANIZO
It was another wild deadline day across Europe but two Premiership clubs made some of the biggest splashes in the transfer market and they did so with some late signings.
Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City both made some last-minute acquisitions on busy Friday that not only surprised many fans and pundits, but also helped bolster the clubs' already-loaded rosters for the Premiership campaign and beyond.
The Spurs signed U.S. men's national team attacker Clint Dempsey from Fulham and they also added talented French goalkeeper Hugo Lloris from Ligue 1 juggernaut Lyon in the closing hours. Manchester City, meanwhile, built on an impressive day that included the captures of Maicon and Scott Sinclair by acquiring Javi Garcia of Benfica just before the stroke of midnight, capping a hectic final day in the transfer window.
Here is a rundown of some of the other top transfers that went down on deadline day:
DEADLINE DAY TRANSFERS
Nigel De Jong to AC MILAN from Manchester City.
Javi Garcia to MANCHESTER CITY from Benfica.
Dimitar Berbatov to FULHAM from Manchester United.
Kieran Richardson to FULHAM from Sunderland.
Rafael van der Vaart to HAMBURG from Tottenham.
Scott Sinclair to MANCHESTER CITY from Swansea City.
Hugo Lloris to TOTTENHAM from Lyon.
Michael Essien to REAL MADRID on loan from Chelsea.
Ibrahim Afellay to SCHALKE 04 from Barcelona.
Joey Barton to MARSEILLE on loan from Quens Park Rangers.
Yossi Benayoun to WEST HAM on loan from Chelsea.
Giovani Dos Santos to MALLORCA from Tottenham.
Pablo Hernandez to SWANSEA CITY from Valencia.
Ashkan Dejagah to FULHAM from Wolfsburg
Niklas Bendtner to JUVENTUS on loan from Arsenal.
Steven Nzonzi to STOKE CITY from Blackburn.
Alessandro Del Piero to SYDNEY FC.
Ryan Babel to AJAX.
Luca Toni to FIORENTINA.
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Which of these deadline day deals did you like the best? Which teams were the real winners/losers on the final day of the transfer window? Who do you see tearing it up with his new club this season?
Share your thoughts below.
from the live transfer stream on ESPN:
Jon Carter: ESPN understands that the fee Fulham wanted for Dempsey from Liverpool was higher than that they accepted from Spurs or Villa
and it seems to make perfect sense if you think about the way things played out. Not sure if we’ll ever know FOR SURE
@J.M., I was just getting around to asking what song Mancini was belting out right then, and then I saw your question!
Can’t believe no one’s commented on the amazing picture of Mancini on this article. How can there NOT be a caption contest with that one?
Mr Mike,
This is business not fantasy football league.
If you don’t realise that the current economic climate means that 6 million or whatever doesn’t buy what it used to or that each transfer market period is a separate unique event,or that player transfer prices are quite dynamic due to extenuating circums tances, then you should not be negotiating player transfers.
There are only so many Chelseas. And once they buy up the younger goalscorers they need, they are off the table. Which leaves you with a lot of clubs that have to sell to buy. Clint has only done it once and at his age 90% of the buyers will look at him and think he had a career year and is unlikely to repeat it. Clint needed a club that was looking for a guy exactly like him,i.e, probably good for another year or two,versatile and one that understood his intangibles.
Spurs were in London and obviously saw a lot of him. It may be a coincidence but Jol is a much respected and well liked former Spurs manager and JK is a Spurs icon. One would suspect they were consulted.
And once the VDV, Modric and Gio moves fell into place, Dempsey emerged as an obvious replacement but only then. Both he and Spurs were lucky it worked out as it did.
Andy Carroll had one standout year(sound familiar?) and LFC splashed 35 million on him to their everlasting regret. Liverpool has recently spent all kinds of crazy money on players who were half as good and fit the team less well than Clint does. That sort of very recent high profile stupidity serves as a cautionary tale to everyone the next go around.
Finally, notice the range across different buyers, 4 mil for LFC, 8 mil for AV and 6 mil for Spurs. Spurs were right in the middle so that is probably the true value for a guy like Clint in 2012.
In the end. like any product, Clint was worth, more or less, what people were willing to pay for him.
Liverpool will fight relegation and be mid-table (at best) this year. Just not a very good team in reality.
Other than perhaps planning on retiring at 41 years old, what becomes of Brad Friedel in the immediate future of Spurs now that they’ve got a high priced Hugo Lloris?
Dembele was undeniably Fulham 2nd best player after Dempsey.
I wouldn’t be surprised if their thinking is Lloris will settle in England this season and take over next. After all, Brad’s well over 40, and even though he’s still one of the best keepers in the EPL (IMHO), that can’t be counted on forever.
And, where are you getting all this inside info about Fulham’s demands for Liverpool?
To compare Liverpool’s previous ownership (which was an embarrassment to ownership everywhere) to this one because they dropped the ball on Dempsey’s bid is ridiculous.
This current ownership saved the club from the brink of administration and aside from Andy Carroll and the jury still being out on Jordan Henderson, are running LFC in a respectable fashion.
Btw, I hate LFC, their supporters and everything about them…but I can still respect reality.
I’m fairly tired of Dembele being referred to as one of Fulham’s better players.
In talent? Sure. However, I think there were easily a handful of players that mattered more to Fulham’s success than Dembele.
To each their own, though.
Brad is a professional.
He’ll continue to perform and be available regardless. That said, I have a hard time believing Lloris will walk in and take his job, unless AVB gives it to him. Which, perhaps that’s what you were implying.
That’s what everyone is thinking now
I hardly think Liverpool’s public intentions of Dempsey interest “screwed this up” or made Fulham “ticked off”.
The only people that fumbled this through the process were Jol/Fulham management.
The once fault of Liverpool is being cheap on their bids.
Agreed. I had thought he had things locked down, but not if they are paying money to pry a starter from Lyon. I’m kind of disappointed, I still think he is our best keeper.
Yeah, I couldn’t find the pound symbol!!
Van Persie is also 29 (the two obviously aren’t in the same class). It’s worth noting that Dempsey started his career pretty late (by soccer standards).
I guess the new Liverpool ownership is just as bad if not worse thatn the last one –insane that they would let Dempsey go, this does not do any good for thier Liverpool marketing campaing in the US.
Actually they paid £6 million for Dempsey, which works out to about $9.5 million.
The other thing is that Dempsey is 29 years old.
…don’t particularly enjoy being too cynical about this, but it is relatively widely known that, in England in particular, transfer fees for domestic players are inflated for a variety of marketing and presumably sporting reasons (they don’t need to adapt to the league etc), as well as (and probably most importantly) the dealings of English agents and club executives. Combine the wrong (or right if you are “in the deal”) two or more of these and you will get a heftier transfer and some nice and juicy percentage-based commissions. Incidentally, this also leads to some English players with the wrong (or right) agents inexplicably being dealt with over and over again via transfers or loans, sometimes without a bearing on their actual prior performance.
Not sure what Liverpool are thinking to be honest. They have paid insane money for English players like Henderson, Carroll and Downing. It is their own fault that they messed around with Dempsey’s head, but if they couldn’t get Dempsey why the hell didn’t they go after anyone else? Too much pressure is on Suarez and Liverpool are going to finish around where they did last year.
Chelsea spending more than 80M pounds in the transfer window renders your condescending argument irrelevant. Please stick with responding to my original statement:
$6-7M to spend on a midfielder who scored 23 goals last season is ridiculous.
why? I think he will fight for his place. Lloris is obviously their keeper of the future but Freidel is still one of the best around.
Fulham come out of this extraordinarily well. I still expect them to finish in the top 10 despite losing their two best players. Richardson and Berbatov are decent replacements. Berba can score just as many as Dempsey did, and while Richardson is no Dembele, I believe he’ll do well.
In addition Ruiz and Petric seem to have a connection already and Dejagah and Rodallega should contribute well.
Bocanegra on loan to Racing Santander.
Can Dempsey play tomorrow for Tottenham?
Stoke looking crowded in midfield. Edu & Cameron with a fight on their hands.
I would assume Brad Fredil is done at Tottenham
Yeah, it seems there is this thing called a recession in Europe.
It turns out a lot of people who had money not that long ago may not have it anymore.
I mean I know he kind of botched the deal but still.
I just can’t believe there was no more interest for his services from other teams. Six or $7 million for someone who scored 23 goals in a season is ridiculous.
Could you imagine an essien to Real Madrid loan a few years ago? That would have been front page news. Today it kind of slipped by without much notice. Fulham had a good day.
They screwed up by making this a public saga which ticked off Fulham. Liverpool would’ve had to extraordinarily overpay (like they did in the Henderson and Downing deals) to bring in Clint once the situation deteriorated. Fulham were willing to sell at 6-7M quid to Tottenham, Aston Villa, Sunderland, pretty much anyone else interested but Liverpool. This transfer was lost weeks, maybe months ago barring a truly ridiculous offer from Anfield.
Can’t wait til he scores against Liverpool.
ugh arsenal with nothing
Liverpool paid $30m for Jordan freaking Henderson last year and wouldn’t go higher than $7m for Dempsey. Seriously.