£35 m for Callum Wilson ! It makes Jay Rods fee at £20m look a bargain
The fees have got mental when a very average striker can be valued at £35m.The worrying thing is money bags Chelsea will pay this.

£20m for Jay Rod was never expensive. Not when we paid 17/18m for Wood
£35m is probably fair considering he regularly scores goals, what he's worth to Bournmouth (who could they get to replace him?) and today's market

But if Chelsea want to compete with Man City then surely they have to get far better than Wilson. That's the market they need to shop in.

Man City have Aguero and Jesus. On another planet ability wise in comparison to Wilson.

JTClaret wrote:what he's worth to Bournmouth (who could they get to replace him?) and today's market

This ^

If they'd signed him this season for 35million and with 6 goals, 7 assists and Bournemouth 6th in the league it might look reasonable. All the money people would be crowing about how much ambition Bournemouth had shown.
But he didn't, he signed for 3million in the Championship in 2014. Shows in part why teams like us are happy to keep hold of players like Vokes & Barnes who were cheap but keep ticking over.

Spijed wrote:Man City have Aguero and Jesus. On another planet ability wise in comparison to Wilson.

But what do ManU have, a £75million bud, could do worse than £30m on Wilson.

Any player in the "other 14" who now shows any promise now gets snapped up by the top 6 who can offer them far more money.

Sat watching the Chelsea game the other week was the first time I've been really disillusioned by it all. Any game against the top 6 is like a game at school where instead of alternate picks, one captain has the first 10 picks of players and the other team just gets who is left.

We paid £15m for Chris Wood.
£20m is not a bargain for Jay - but that is the current market.

£35m for Wilson is to be fair only paper talk at the moment. He's having his best season by far this year - but this is his 4th consecutive season in the Premier League and he is yet to score double figures. His average number of goals prior to this season in the Premier League is just over 6 a season and he has scored less than Ashley Barnes has scored in the 3 seasons he has played in the Premier League (excluding this season).

£35m is ridiculous and just shows the madness of the market when somebody has a decent few games.

Sat watching the Chelsea game the other week was the first time I've been really disillusioned by it all. Any game against the top 6 is like a game at school where instead of alternate picks, one captain has the first 10 picks of players and the other team just gets who is left.

There's an article in today's Guardian about this season's (so far) greater than ever dominance of the top echelon. The subheader is "The top five clubs have played the bottom five 19 times this season and won every one. There is nothing to celebrate in the top flight’s great divide"

Other extracts:
"This is the first time in the Premier League era that three clubs – Manchester City, Chelsea and Liverpool – are still unbeaten after 11 games. Never before have five Premier League clubs had 23 points or more at this stage."
&
"The notable shift this season has taken place lower down, where a group of clubs are in danger of being cut adrift even before the leaves have finished falling from the trees, with their plight so desperate that league victories in November are celebrated like winning cup finals in May. They are playing survival football with 27 matches remaining."

The "you need 40 points to survive" maxim is going to be devalued this season I think.

LeadBelly wrote:The "you need 40 points to survive" maxim is going to be devalued this season I think.

Clubs have only ever been relegated on 40 points or more once since the formation of the 38 game season.

For the last ten years at least 36-37 pts has usually been enough.

Wilson has had a little run of goals and everyones gone wild

He's average at best

Hmm, Richarlison cost 40m so I can see why Wilson would be at least 35m.

LeadBelly wrote:There's an article in today's Guardian about this season's (so far) greater than ever dominance of the top echelon. The subheader is "The top five clubs have played the bottom five 19 times this season and won every one. There is nothing to celebrate in the top flight’s great divide"

Other extracts:
"This is the first time in the Premier League era that three clubs – Manchester City, Chelsea and Liverpool – are still unbeaten after 11 games. Never before have five Premier League clubs had 23 points or more at this stage."
&
"The notable shift this season has taken place lower down, where a group of clubs are in danger of being cut adrift even before the leaves have finished falling from the trees, with their plight so desperate that league victories in November are celebrated like winning cup finals in May. They are playing survival football with 27 matches remaining."

The "you need 40 points to survive" maxim is going to be devalued this season I think.

And this is exactly why your average fan (not the big 6 plastics) is getting seriously disillusioned. To be honest I have never before heard so many fans now saying a Euro super league is a good idea to get rid of this domination. To be fair it's the same in other top footballing nations in Europe and you could say that at least we have a top 6 as opposed to a top two or three, but here it's the sheer overwhelming fire power of our big clubs. I don't know the stats precisely but I'll bet Barcelona getting beat in Spain happens more often than City getting beat here.
City have scored (including Europe) 17 (that's seventeen) goals in their last 3 home games. If that doesn't start alarm bells ringing I don't know what does. I wouldn't mind betting that we aren't too far away from a double figure victory by someone soon. When that happens we will be well down the road of Sunday football league scores. Surely somebody somewhere must see the madness of this. I am convinced that we will soon start seeing a decline in attendances in general as people come to realise that there are only 6 people at the PL party and everyone else is just a party crasher.

houseboy wrote:And this is exactly why your average fan (not the big 6 plastics) is getting seriously disillusioned. To be honest I have never before heard so many fans now saying a Euro super league is a good idea to get rid of this domination. To be fair it's the same in other top footballing nations in Europe and you could say that at least we have a top 6 as opposed to a top two or three, but here it's the sheer overwhelming fire power of our big clubs. I don't know the stats precisely but I'll bet Barcelona getting beat in Spain happens more often than City getting beat here.
City have scored (including Europe) 17 (that's seventeen) goals in their last 3 home games. If that doesn't start alarm bells ringing I don't know what does. I wouldn't mind betting that we aren't too far away from a double figure victory by someone soon. When that happens we will be well down the road of Sunday football league scores. Surely somebody somewhere must see the madness of this. I am convinced that we will soon start seeing a decline in attendances in general as people come to realise that there are only 6 people at the PL party and everyone else is just a party crasher.

To be honest I agree with a lot of what you say, I personally am looking forward to the Newcastle game far more than the backs to the wall and likely defeat to Liverpool. A league needs to be competitive and at present it isn’t.

Dy1geo wrote:To be honest I agree with a lot of what you say, I personally am looking forward to the Newcastle game far more than the backs to the wall and likely defeat to Liverpool. A league needs to be competitive and at present it isn’t.

Absolutely. The idea of our defence as it is currently performing facing Mo and his mates is actually quite frightening, whereas a run out against a really poor Newcastle is far more mouth watering. Until recently anyone could at least dream of beating the top 6 (as indeed we did last season, not to mention some very creditable draws), but things have noticeably changed this season, as per the article saying 19 games between the top 6 and the bottom clubs resulting in 19 out of 19 victories. City have now scored 5 or more goals on numerous occasions over the last couple of seasons, this should not be happening in a supposed top class league. I really hope that City get a serious blow to their finances with the ongoing investigation but I don't honestly think they will because no-one in power in football seems to have the stomach for the fight (or maybe they have a vested interest). It's a shame I feel this way because I have always liked City as a club and their fans are (or where) down to earth and witty. At least most of them come from Manchester and its environs.

Roll on the super league.

Woodleyclaret wrote:£35 m for Callum Wilson ! It makes Jay Rods fee at £20m look a bargain
The fees have got mental when a very average striker can be valued at £35m.The worrying thing is money bags Chelsea will pay this.

His goalscoring record at both the PL and Championship levels is considerably better than Jay Rod's

Thanks !