Transfer Talk - 2018/19 Season

Was a serious hamstring injury AFAIK. Completely tore it.

That Ifill bloke did OK coming off similar injuries.

Just read the article, apparently he's been classed as a "B-type" marquee player and we would receive "most funding" for his signing which would still fall under our salary cap.  I thought the whole point of a marquee player was that you could pay him outside of the cap? 
Or are we choosing to pay him under the cap because we can't afford to pay him more and the funding we'll get won't be enough?

Nah we're saving our marquee for when Busquets comes

don't care how we get him - but we have to have him. Clearly class, can shoot off both feet, holds his feet well even when getting hacked (goal #4), even with a lack of pace he'll have the positioning to take the shots and composure to time them well. Have him leading the line with Krishna/Burns/Williams on the wings using their pace to get the ball to him. Assuming of course we run a 4-3-3.

Obafemi Martins >>>>>> Emile Heskey

End. Of.

Fixed.

He's probably still quicker than many of our players

I think he'd earned the chance to be given a go. He wasn't up to it and left quickly. Nothing wrong with that.

I remember his first game for us, a 2-0 win over Sydney where Fenton scored that diving header. Totori hit the bar quite late on and looked lively for his cameo. I thought he looked an astute pickup haha

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/a-league/10...

"All up, there have been 12 applications from clubs to use FFA's marquee fund since it was established but only one successful signing - Keisuke Honda to Melbourne Victory."

Sorry to be a killjoy but would seem there is a 8.33% chance, Nix will get a potential Martins deal over the line. 

That's unless he loves wind and rain, in which case that percentage would heavily increase.

I don't think you can look at those numbers and conclude the likelihood of him signing for us is only 8%. For a start, you can't assume all 12 applications had an equal likelihood of happening. Torres was probably more unlikely to come play in A-League than many others. I would assume that if a club went after Messi, the likelihood of him signing wouldn't be 8.33%.

You've also come up with that number by saying 'only 1 of 12 has been successful'. Martins is one of those 12 though, and you've already assumed in the calculation that it will be a failure. I think at least one other of that 12 still may happen as well.

What's the odds Merrick would have created a good A league player out of him? Anyway great name this guy! Our first marquee striker eh

If anyone thinks Totori would have been a competent player at A-league level, you're seriously misguided. The dude was basically a park footballer.

I don't know if the club commonly does this or not but I've seen them respond to a couple of Martins tweets on Twitter. Without knowing their history on this, it gives me a little bit of hope that it might be a happening thing. 

If that were true, it would render the amount of All White's he made complete fools of much less than park footballers

Aye, huge disrespect to Totori there. 

He did it, what, once or twice? The one time I remember was in Honiara in 2012 after we'd been knocked out by New Caledonia, which is a hardly representative example.

Look, he had good physical characteristics, and fair amount of pace, which set him apart at the NZFC level when he played there, but that was some time ago. Those same characteristics wouldn't set him apart as much (or maybe at all) in the Handy Prem today because even that league has significantly improved in a tactical sense in that same period.

When Totori got to the Nix, those same physical characteristics were nowhere near enough to get him by in the league on anything approaching a consistent basis. And his big minus as a footballer was that he didn't really get the game at the tactical level (which is were the comment about him being a park footballer comes from). And when you consider his age when he got to the Phoenix, a player like that simply wasn't worth the effort. But it's not the first nor the last Phoenix made a signing like that.

I totally get what you're saying and you've made your point well, but I respectfully disagree. He really tore it up in the NZFC with more than just pace and the league at time was pretty good. His pace was a big asset, but there were faster players who were much worse than him and his dribbling ability was a huge threat.

When he arrived at the Phoenix he really was just used sparingly out wide in a 4-4-2 in a team that wasn't really coached (if you believe Siggy). Given time and a proper integration to pro football I think he could have been an excellent a-league player.

Just my opinion, I understand that a player who didin't 'achieve' can be polarizing

On a slightly different but related tack, one guy I regret not seeing more of is Ricardo Clarke, who was here at the same time as Totori. Admittedly I didn't seem much of him, but remember seeing him in the friendly against YHM in Palmy, and thinking that he had exciting attacking potential, but he never really got any decent minutes in the league.

"Nah, mate, no fudgein chance. Have you got Matty Simon's number?"

Looks like they learned from the Essien shut down and are prolonging our hope/good media attention.

Looks like he's carved out a decent career for himself, playing in the top flight in Venezuela and now Portugal.

One Solomon Island player didn't work out (debatable), so none of them are any good - is a fallacy.

Le'ai looked better than any of the NZ under 16s.

https://int.soccerway.com/players/ricardo-clarke/2...

Still only 25. Now in Paraguay. Seems his stint in Portugal was very short (total 25 mins playing time at Boavista). 

Sadly playing in Venezuela would probably have meant very little to his bank balance. That country is a tragic basket case. Met a Colombian goalie who played in top flight there before leaving after his club, didn't pay his meagre wages for 6 months.

Is that why Jeremy and Totori go together in perfect harmony?

So what happened on NewsHub? 

Too busy showering the kids and getting them ready for bed, so missed the news.

Rudan said there's a long way to go but Martins seems keen.

Tried finding the tweets we are apparently as a club commenting on, but couldn't find anything - similar to how we found out Taylor was coming... a good sign.

If Martins is a B level marquee - I wonder if Taylor would have qualified, younger and with more games in the premier league.

Hmmm..hamstrung since April.Doesnt bode well for arriving fighting fit.

Piney played an interview with Rudan from last night's launch, on Radio Sport this morning. Rudan confirmed they'd been in talks with Essien but when that ended, they approached Martins. At this stage, they're waiting to hear back from him.

Also when asked about any other Aus/NZ signings, mentioned Tratt trialling (back from injury), and Andre de Jong rejoining squad on trip to WSW.

Watched a bunch of videos of him carving up defensive lines for NUFC and celebrating wildly with Taylor. Desperate to see them reunited at the nix. Also promising news on ADJ, hope it works out

Also really hoping we can pull this one through. We went for Essien first, but I actually think Martins could be better for us anyway being a year or two younger, and also looks idea for the elusive goal scoring forward.

It mentioned in one of the stories I read that we are talking to a few players currently. Excited about the season again now.

Shows how important club transparency is! Even just little leaks or looks behind the scenes like this reinstil hope in us

At the same time, I'm happy for the club to keep who they are talking to quiet when that's best for them getting the deal. 

Glad that the club were quick to clarify that the Essien thing was a no go, and that they've been open that they are hoping to get this through. I know some people thought the club should pretend like Essien was maybe signing when he wasn't, but for me, that's a Central Coast Mariners style publicity over nothing tactic. The club sucked big time last year at being open and communicative, and hopefully that's being rectified. 

I took the young fella to watch them train one day and he was brilliant, super quick and just ran around skinning everyone

Didn't he get injured at some point? I recall he was ignored for a lot of his stay

What I remember of Totori was that he was quick but didn’t have a football brain.