Just to back that up a bit (all clips from this season): He's creative, can drop deep and links up well with other forwards/wingers Can dribble and create chance for himself (although I'd say this is probably one of the weakest parts of his attacking play) Shows good movement around the penalty area, good variety in his finishes
Kamara, Choudhury, Martins, Davis, Hause and seemingly this guy, that's 6 maximum, including Hause who isn't going to be fit any time soon and who might not even be here soon enough, we have problems with squad registration rules, but loanees isn't really one of them
I was thinking more along the lines of if we were looking at adding any of the many other names who have been linked on loan as well. Tuanzebe, Pellistri, Hughes, Burns…
Honestly, I don't see how what Costa seems to be doing right now is a huge departure from a lot of what Bayat was doing, except it's swapping Nantes and Charleroi with Benfica. Just raiding the club you have strong connections with appears as much laziness as "actual scouting". It's obviously early days, but it's not as if Ferreira has hit the ground running. It can be beneficial to have clubs whereby you can leverage relationships to make deals you otherwise couldn't be able to, but only if the players a good and the fees make sense. I'll add that obviously her and Ubenga haven't been here long so might not have had much time and chance to cast their net wider to find us players, but so far it's not been adventurous.
From the very reliable Jason Burt. The €100 million buy-out clause did make make laugh though. Watford are close to signing the exciting young Benfica striker Henrique Araujo on loan for the rest of the season. If he arrives, the Portugal Under-21 international will add to head coach Slaven Bilic’s attacking options, which have been severely hit by an injury crisis. Araujo – known as ‘Henrique’ – is regarded as a rising star of Portuguese football and if the 20-year-old is signed then it will be regarded as something of a coup for the Championship club. A final decision is expected on Wednesday on the deal. Watford will not have an option to buy the forward. The broad details of the transfer have been agreed but negotiations are continuing with Benfica who are willing to allow Henrique to go in return for valuable first-team experience. Henrique has a €100 million (£88 million) buy-out clause in his contract and has already played for – and scored for – Benfica in the Champions League.
He'd probably increase his value more though if he did well in the Championship than if he did well for a mid-table Portuguese club.
Bayat has done a deal for £5m for Bayo having just been sold for £1m. There seems to be some dodgy goings on with him Bit unfair in Ferreira not hitting the ground running, he's played 45 minutes. This lad seems to be very highly thought of where as Bayo was not. I imagine most scouts have their favourite places to look and have more knowledge of certain teams. Might be an easy win if it goes through
Every youngster with any potential to play for a CL club in the future has a €100m buyout these days.
Bayo was thought of well enough to earn a move to Celtic when he was young. He'd also scored 11 goals in his last 14 starts for Charleroi before moving to us. It's not as if he was a complete nobody. This is true - you can also look at Burnley cruising the league after using Kompany's influence to mostly sign Man City loanees and players he knew from Belgium. Also look at Wolves with their Mendes connections. I just find it funny that most forum members were only recently bemoaning that we mostly just signed players who Bayat had a connection to, but are now pleased or not making a fuss when we start just signing players who Costa has a connection to.
I think it's more that Bayat has allegations against him, so doesn't appear to be the most clean-cut character to be involved with (tryna be polite), and the signings went on for years - with a very mixed success rate and strange signings in the mix. Just two signings from a club Helena Costa has a connection with at the start of their role is not something worth making a fuss about. But if it turned out Costa was corrupt and we pretty much only signed Benfica players for 2-3 years, then I think we would all be unhappy with that. Very different situation.
Yes I did think Bayo would come in and score goals. To some extent he has, but his all round game has not developed. So happy to change my tune
Costa is leveraging her connnections to do deals which are of benefit to both clubs. Bayat used his connections to do deals which are beneficial primarily to him / his brother, and any benefit to the clubs is incidental. Benfica produce an enormous amount of talented young players, and struggle to give them all game time. A positive relationship with them is a good thing for us.
Hopefully he's brilliant but I'm still concerned if we are going to rely on a 20 yr old 4th choice at Benfica who's never played in the UK before, will only be here for 4 months, with guaranteed game time, and no option to buy.
Well, on paper I wouldn't be keen on that. But would also need to judge it on it's results - how much we achieved as a club in that time, the quality of the players brought in etc. But that's not happened, and is probably unlikely to happen (certainly didn't at Eintracht Frankfurt). So it's not really a comparable sitaution to Mogi at all yet.
I for one am extremely pleased if this goes through. Currently we have one striker who quite frankly is hopeless controlling and passing a football. What's not to like about getting in a young striker who is well thought of by club and country? We needed a striker have little to no money and they seemed to of pulled off something of a coup. Having a working relationship with a club like Benfica can only be beneficial imo. We have someone he already knows at the club plus Portuguese speaking players if his English isn't up to scratch. Fingers crossed it works out for us, him and Benfica.
One person being charged with financial crime in a very public case and the other person is not. I quite like that direction of travel personally. Add to the fact the vast amount of Bayat clients are dogs*** and I’m happy to give it a chance.
Having read your post you are right. I’d rather put my faith in the £8m multi layered Bayat terd that is Bayo and Kalu, than this stud on loan.
Partly to do with better players, partly not being charge ridiculous transfer fees and partly because there doesn't seem anything untoward about DeCosta's dealings
I'm actually undecided about this player I've never heard of and never seen play, so I am not writing him off without a thought, like I did with Kalu, Bayo, Okoye and Ferreira. That's as optimistic as I can be.
How many months of scouting has Costa completing since arriving fully knowing the needs of our squad and the margins to work within? No issue going to Teams with connections in the early days to get players they know in the door, not like there is some kind of window to slam shut soon….
Best thing about this is that we were in the pocket of Belgium's most connected agent for years yet Burnley turn their attention to that market for one window under Kompany and pick up two young stars for less than the fees we paid for the likes of Kayembe, Bayo, Kabasele, Oulare. Even better, they signed Zourary from Bayat's brother's club!
Benfica fans on Reddit are frustrated by this, with one poster claiming he's as talented as Ramos who scored the hat-trick at the World Cup against Switzerland. Probably hyperbolic but that sounds exciting. That excitement is helped by the fact he's scored in the Champions League at 20.
