Can here the complaints now - if he turns out to be any good . Does this mean we cannot get any more loan players in ?
So the delay over deciding which team he was joining delayed the permit process? (Question: I don’t know)
The EPL has more money. They should refocus all their efforts on us. They need to send all the best players they have to us immediately.
That would really go down well with the Udinese fans! I doubt they would come to play in the Championship and cost us too much or certainly raise a few eyebrows .
It doesn’t really matter who has ownership of the player. We’re in bed with Udinese, always have been. That’s the deal. They could switch Martins to us on a free if they fancied it. To think a player has signed with us is an illusion. He’s signed to the Pozzo group and can be switched between Watford and Udinese on loan, for free or for £16m depending on the need at the time.
It does when we have limited loan spots that we can use in a matchday squad! I suspect, if indeed he was purchased by Udinese, cash flow issues were the reason why he wasn't bought by us
Martins brings our loan contingent up to 5, which is the maximum you can include in a matchday squad, but as it looks like Hause won't be in a matchday squad any time soon, we have one more spot we can fill
I may have put 2 and 2 together but that's what I took from a combination of the below + the fact that Udinese never announced him + the fact he never showed on the official Serie A transfers thing (https://www.legaseriea.it/en/serie-a/calcio-mercato) until the 2nd Jan, when some deals were done on the 1st Jan
They can control 2 of our loans in Martins and Kamara. They must feel the situation is ok or else they wouldn’t have tied their hands together like that. Maybe Bello comes in and we end the loan with Kamara?
Currently our only genuine left-back is Morris, so we'd be mad to get rid of Kamara, as brainless as he can be
Do the high quail top level International players on bigger wages who are settled with their family in Italy have any say in this human trafficking operation?
I reckon Sema could even be better at LB going forward this season than Kamara. Though with our current injuries we may still need him in attack.
Come where the real money is my lads. Pozzo Enterprise PLC needs to focus on us. Not the other way around.
But he’s been registered with Udinese/Serie A per the Serie A website since Jan 2! Doesn’t make much sense for him to only sign the deal now. Maybe they are just running some extra fitness tests. Also, that Andrew French report seemed to lean heavily on a UdineseBlog article.
Andrew French writes in the Watford Observer that "reports in Brazil say he is one of a number of players whose club sides have requested permission to miss the tournament." However, a revised U-20 squad list for the tournament was published by Brazil on 5th January and none of the eight players (who were not released by their clubs) are now listed in the squad. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_South_American_U-20_Championship_squads
Well, AF has been at pains at times to say he won’t write anything before it’s been reasonably corroborated. So he’s either moved away from his usual way of reporting - or he’s had the info backed up. Either way, the club’s cloak and dagger preferences when it comes to communication have struck again. It’s most annoying when they do it over matters where it’s totally unnecessary to do so.
My comment was not meant as a criticism of Andrew French, who was quite vague when he referred to "reports in Brazil". I simply wanted to provide some additional information. There is not any doubt that Matheus Martins is no longer part of the Brazilian squad for the U-20 tournament. I pasted a link to Wikipedia because it is in English, but Transfermarkt also shows the same squad list. Here is the original announcement (in Portuguese) by the Brazilian Football Confederation on 4th January about Ramon Menezes' revised squad list for the U-20 tournament in Colombia: https://www.cbf.com.br/selecao-bras...-convocados-para-o-torneio-sul-americano-2023 I agree with you that Watford FC could be more transparent in their communication at times when there is absolutely no reason to be secretive.
https://www.watfordfc.com/news/official-martins-completes-loan-move-from-udinese Confirmed by the club that it's a loan now.
Not come through yet but might by the weekend. "The highly-rated 19-year-old has been training with Slaven Bili*’s squad, however his involvement in Watford’s upcoming Sky Bet Championship clash at home to Blackpool (Saturday January 14, 3pm KO) remains subject to international clearance."
Now we can look forward to relying on this 19-year-old who's never played outside Brazil being instantly ready to come in and single-handedly save our season!!!
The securing of international clearance is evidently a drawn out process. Hopefully the computer says yes.
A good signing and he will be as exciting to watch as JP I hope. South american flare players, gotta love em.
On a slightly different note. I remember when Granada was sold Pozzo moved all the players he wanted onto Udinese books during previous transfer windows meaning the new Granada owner had bought a shell with a massive amount of loan players. I say this only because of the fact we know he has been looking to sell at least a share of the clubs and so he may be trying to hedge his bets. I realise the main talent has remained on Watford's books, or at least for now, so I may be barking up the wrong tree.
I am incredibly confused as to why this wasn't announced straight away? It's not like he was bought by a person and that person was deciding which team to give him to. He had to officially be signed by a club with money being transferred etc. Totally bizarre, even for our club.
