The fact that Leicester City have used money in the region of what Harry Maguire is worth makes the math of Leicester City’s transfer budget all put in place. With a minor result of last seasons activities, £1.6million, surely this adds up mathematically
Manchester City were the preferred move for Harry Maguire with a chance to play for the English champions next season, secure his place in the England team and at the same time be at a club that can compete in Europe.
We have earlier seen Manchester City keen on the England defender, but Top is a shrewd businessman and will see how long he can wait to get the price as high as possible. Leicester City will benefit on the transfer fee of Aaron Wan-Bissaka who has inflated the fees and would see the value of Harry Maguire rise to at least £90million.
The so called gentlemens agreement from last summer might still be in place. The fact that Harry Maguire is said to have handed in a transfer request , tells us all what this player is thinking. He is another of those players that will go in to the category of players that are not really 100% committed to the course at Leicester City and sees his status higher than the club and don’t really care about fans, manager and the owners at the club. Maguire is 26 and this could be his “best chance” for a lucrative deal.
Owners and management will be disappointed with this type of behavior as they was with Riyad Mahrez, Danny Drinkwater and N’Golo Kantè who also looked at Leicester City as a stepping stone to higher grounds. All of them brilliant players, who would if they had stayed at Leicester City, taken the club to a totally different level. LCFC would have seen trophies in the cabinet and compete for top silverware every year.
We will probably have to wait for a decision on Maguire, and we could see Man City again enter the race. But with financial fair play ticking, you have to consider your moves with money carefully.
If Leicester City hadn’t sold Riyad Mahrez last season they would probably have been in difficulties with financial fair play, or not been able to buy any new players. That has to be considered when taking players in. So far Tielemans, Perez and James are three major signings with a total price in the region of £80million. Leicester are keen on one more player and with four or five, maybe six options in the position of Harry Maguire he looks gone when the season kicks off.
The fact that the club also have so many players surplus to those 25 seen as the full squad, could of course finance a number of new signings, but so far clubs out there looks little or not interested in players currently not seen as first team members at Leicester City.
Players such as Andy King, Matty James and Adrien Silva will not get the money they are on at Leicester City and at their age they will of course not throw money “in the bin” and insted see their contracts out.
TCF don’t know how money is flushed into the club and how “gifts” or “sponsor funds” are handled, but looking back, you will see that the club looks to try to run “daily business” within the club and not act on benefits from owners to try to reduce a possible heavy loss by the end of the financial year.
Would of course hoped that the best players would stay at the club, but sadly it looks again as we have seen in the past few years that “big money” sales are needed to secure the financial balance and not get in conflict with financial fair play.
The fact that the club have made no official statement about Harry Maguire and said “he is not for sale” and instead rumors are that he can be sold for £90million, is of course a “carrot” for the “big boys” to start bidding and as we have seen Manchester United and Manchester City are both keen on a move for the England defender.
Leicester City will not take into consideration what Harry Maguire would like and what club he thinks is best, but get the best deal possible for a player that last season agreed to a new contract just to milk out another season with increased wages.
Sadly the financial model Leicester City are on at the moment and the strategy used will see one big star leaving the club after every season. Anyway the players coming in and the current squad must take on the challenge of filling gaps.
Doing errors in the transfer market as Claudio Ranieri, Claude Puel and Craig Shakespeare did with a number of very expensive signings will of course hurt the club massively. The fact that you buy a number of very expensive players and use money on those you are not certain will play in your first team, is a risky business model.
TCF would love to see Leicester City keeping their best players and not sell them when you see a great team in the making. This has happened year after year and you will probably never catch those top clubs financially, and life in the future must be carefully handled without errors in management appointments, failures in the transfer market and vital ground redevelopments stopping a great future. We have seen this at much bigger clubs, just to mention, Leeds United, Aston Villa and Sheffield Wednesday.
Fans likes to think that money will be available and you can get everything you want in the shop window without taking into consideration the hurdles put in place, that competitors will not always “welcome” your approach and that the world of football now is much more transparent than it was a few years back.
Players are first and for all looking after themselves and their families and not all of them will be happy to stay and might look at it with a reasonable fact that my options are at the moment better somewhere else, and with a “price-tag” of £90million you can probably see yourself as a player at the best clubs on the planet, and then being at a club not even competing in Europe, and at the age of 26, you might start thinking.
TCF would have hoped that the club could have been financially in balance and able to finance transfers, without selling Harry Maguire, but with the current history of the player, last seasons unrest and the rumours appearing again this summer, it is a way to cash in and hope that it will be possible to move on.
Last season Leicester City played a number of games without Harry Maguire in the team and it’s possible to cope without him, but at the moment we have not seen a clear candidate to fill the gap. Caglar Soyuncu and Filip Benkovic are both to be considered.
Rumors about Tarkowski (Burnley) and Dunk (Brighton) might be there, but hopefully Brendan Rodgers will stay away from those options and just concentrate on filling the gap with his current alternatives.
Brendan Rodgers is said to have his priority on finding a new “winger” with the right attitude, and there are several names linked, all of them priced with a fee in the region between £15 and £20 million, which again makes sense if Leicester City would like £90million for Maguire.
The new signing of a flank midfielder will probably not happen before the Harry Maguire fee is set, then Rodgers will be able to go out in the market again and buy his preferred player.
These are thoughts of TCF based on previous seasons dealings, the decrease of revenue without European football, and the fact that no other clubs are able to attract players at Leicester City, seen as selling transfer objects, who are on salaries no others can afford or even consider.
We could see possible moves as we did with Leo Ulloa, still on the Leicester City payroll, but these are moves difficult to handle. Loans will probably happen, and could be possible for Ghezzal, King, James and several others as we have seen in the past, but that will not be the first priority of clubs now chasing permanent moves.
Transfer budget
- In
- Youri Tielemans, Monaco, £40million
- James Justin, Luton, £10million
- Ayoze Perez, Newcastle, £30million
- A new winger, £15 to £20 million
- Out
- Harry Maguire, Man Utd, £90million
Leave a Reply