[quote author=rebel23 link=topic=34078.msg885326#msg885326 date=1244582632]
[quote author=Rosco link=topic=34078.msg885321#msg885321 date=1244582463]
What's the reasoning for that Rebel ?
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have a look at the list of players we've signed from other Premier League teams over the last decade and then you might agree its not been a great policy for us.
I prefer to buy foreign or bring our own through, terrier: we never get their top players so it's a moot point. Mascherano was only parked at West Ham, he wasn't their player.
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I've done a little list, but excluded free transfers:
Benitez Transfers:
Craig Bellamy - not a success, sold for a profit
Jermaine Pennant - not a success, sold at a loss
Peter Crouch - mixed bag, sold for a profit
Scott Carson - failure, sold for a profit
Robbie Keane - failure, sold at a loss
Yossi Benayoun - success and cheap
Houllier signings:
Stefan Henchoz - success.
Didi Hamann - didn't come cheap at the time but proved to be worth every penny.
Emile Heskey - not a big success, one great season followed by some less than great ones. Sold for a loss.
Nick Barmby - meh, sold for a loss
Harry Kewell - Disappointment.
It hasn't been that bad.
I do think there's something to be said for not buying too many players from other Premiership clubs though, mainly because they're a lot more expensive and it's difficult to really derive any true value from the investment you make in them.
A simple example is if you wanted a guy capable of scoring 10 league goals a year - if you look at the Premiership players that can do that do you think many/any of them would go for less than £12m ?
Mark Hughes managed to sign two strikers capable of hitting double figures in the Premiership for peanuts. Santa Cruz for 4.5m and McCarthy for ... I dunno what he went for exactly but it was very little. Obviously there's a little bit more of a gamble involved but good scouting should remove a lot of the risk, so you'd be crazy not to consider overseas options (like Dzeko).
One of the curious things in our spending is that despite it being harder to get good value in Premiership dealings, most of our costly errors came from buying outside the Premiership (Diouf, Diao, Cisse)