[Archived] Bentley

[Wolverine]

Bents to Newcastle. Ha! Nice one...

[brian_gallagher85]

That comes later.

Anyone else watching sky sports atm?

I've always thought that Merson was a knob and too stupid to work as a pundit - he just confirmed it. Any criticism of his beloved Arse is greeted with vociferous ad hominen attacks.

Today it was Bentley and Rovers' turn. Responding to Bentley's comments about his time at Arsenal being boring and not enjoyable, he says that enjoying football is about winning medals and going "20-30 games unbeaten, not getting stuffed at home to Coventry".

Now its Kenwyn Jones. He can't make any comment about players and clubs that are below Arsenal's level without sneering.

It really annoys me to see people who have been so lucky in life, first of all to have been blessed with the talent to play football at the top level, and then to have been dealt with so leniently when others have received lengthy bans for similar offences, behaving so arrogantly, and even worse than that being given a platform to sneer down at everyone else from.

I too saw that after work on Saturday and my first thought was (Please don't use that word again) up you alcholic gambling ######...I felt much better afterwards

[JC4LAB]

Why does Keegan want Bentley.?..Milner and Duff float plenty of good crosses in but theres no one ever on the end of them ..

[Wolverine]

I would imagine because Bentley is one of the best wingers in the Premiership, with the potential to be the best in the England team. He will only leave for a team where he will play every game he can (currently rules out Man U, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea), at a consistantly high level (currently rules out everyone else).

Until we become a regular lower half club again, or until Bentley is seen by Man U as better than Ronaldo, or Rafa drops his rotational policy, or Chelsea get rid of SWP et al, or most likely until Mark Hughes leaes, we shouldn't worry.

Dave's commitment is there and he is trying to spark a reaction from his underperforming team-mates to propel us into the outside chance of a top four place which he is confident we are good enough to achieve.

My opinion is selling him would undoubtedly raise substantial cash but it would be a fruitless exercise. It would project a complete lack of ambition and would speed up our return from whence we came ie, lower league mediocrity.

[krislu]

If we sold Bentley for £15m Im sure Hughes would not have gotten more than approx £5-6m to spend on a replacement.

[CircoWill]

Can't believe people are even suggesting selling Bentley. He's been our best player this season and we miss him awfully when he doesn't play. If we are to ever achieve what we want to then we must keep hold of players like Bentley.

[T4E]

Sorry, your argument completely fails me.

All clubs are contiunously looking for and lining up players all the time- why do you think the club employs 50+ people in and around the senior squad?

And take a look at the current standard of players we are able to target. Amdy Faye? If thats good enough for you then fine, but it's not good enough in my eyes. We must find a way to enable Hughes to look at players of a higher standard than that. That is what my suggestion is geared towards. I'll say it again - all other suggestions are welcome.

bryans point, was that if you sell your best players - very rarely do we replace them with players of the same quality..

when we sold duff -we bought 3 players, that all turned out to be nowhere near as effective as duff

Thats true - but it was also with Souness spending the money. Would you not trust Hughes to do better?

I think we're vastly over-estimating David Bentley's standing within the football world if we are believing that selling him would make us substantially less attractive. I don't recall Tomas Rosicky or Alexander Hleb turning down Arsenal because they'd recently sold Vieira. Likewise Eduardo and Henry. I seem to remember Cristiano Ronaldo replacing David Beckham at United for half the money Becks was sold for. Granted these are clubs much bigger than ours - but they are also names much bigger than David Bentley.

Most successful clubs sell good players in their own time, and usually have replacements lined up. The difference between us and them is we wait to be forced into a sale, then have to scramble to get the money spent.

[Mozzer]

sell our best player, so we can raise abit of money and buy better players then amdy faye..haha

we couldnt even replace bentley with half of what he is worth...

i know were skint-but selling our best players isnt the way forward..

[b12_simon]

That has been the case with most of the team who plays on Gamst's side of the pitch for a good part of the season. Warnock uses Gamst only as a very last resort, Dunn ignored him yesterday too, and I've seen Nelsen do it. We've been hampered by playing with only 10 men for most of the season. I'm all for encouraging people to come into form, but really!!

Reid is one of the few that still passes to Ped but I guess he's still a bit rusty from all that time on the treatment table.

[T4E]

sell our best player, so we can raise abit of money and buy better players then amdy faye..haha

we couldnt even replace bentley with half of what he is worth...

i know were skint-but selling our best players isnt the way forward..

So what is the way forward?

[den]

Keeping hold of them as long as possible?

[Wolverine]

I think investment, loans or youth coming through. None of which are especially likely to yield long term results, or even happen.

I would rather wait on selling Bentley until we have to, more because it would prolong our ability to 'punch above our weight', as many people say. Who knows what will happen? Certainly, none of us do.

I can only hope something significantly good happens soon for us on the money front so we can forget even considering stripping ourselves of assets - especially when the asset in question is settled with us.

Come to think of it, I would be happier seeing one or two other faces leaving to fund new players.

What chance we could get a feeder club relationship with someone in the Championship, such as Blackpool?

[USRoverME]

The danger is that curently Bentley is young and on the fringes of the England team. Sure, he's settled now, but if in the next few years the likes of SWP and Lennon (or given the history of the england team, a midfiedler played out of position on the wing) keep taking the England PT from him, and he never gets more than a token chance, he's going to feel like he has to move on to advance his career. I wouldn't blame him.

We need to find that key balance with players like Bentley, keeping them for as long as possible to advance the team, but still getting value for them when its time for them to move on to sustain the team. And, in the process, having them move on good terms both finanacially and professionally to allow more players of that caliber come to us thinking we can be that same springboard.

I know many on here only want to sign players who lover Rovers and no-one else, but those players don't exist in the game anymore. We are a springboard club, and if we play it right, we can be a successful club because of it.

[T4E]

Keeping hold of them as long as possible?

Would you say that's working now? Are we improving as a team? Is our manager happy? Are the fans?

[den]

Would you say that's working now? Are we improving as a team? Is our manager happy? Are the fans?

Definately working now. I'm absolutely amazed that you continue to argue for selling our best players. Without Rocky and Bentley, where would we be this season?

As for the fans being happy, - well I can only speak for myself Toogs, but yes' I'm happy. Roy Hodgson and Ray Harford sold our best players and were the fans happy then?

[broadsword]

Selling your best players willingly is never the answer, it sends the wrong signals out and whoever you buy as replacements the team is weaker.

[T4E]

Definately working now. I'm absolutely amazed that you continue to argue for selling our best players. Without Rocky and Bentley, where would we be this season?

As for the fans being happy, - well I can only speak for myself Toogs, but yes' I'm happy. Roy Hodgson and Ray Harford sold our best players and were the fans happy then?

I wouldn't say you speak for yourself, but you certainly don't speak for all. Particularly the manager.

My original post on this thread was to suggest that perhaps we'd be best to cash in on Bentley, as a drop in his value would represent the 3rd time we've missed out on a potentially big profit. I am not arguing for selling all our best players. My point is that there is something to be said for buying low and selling high - finding the right time to sell may be the key to our future, rather than hanging on to players only to have their values plummet.

Once again I'll repeat - I'm advocating this due to Mark Hughes' excellent record in the transfer market. Comparisons to Hodgson, Harford, Kidd, Souness etc etc as keep being made are completely irrelevant. If we did not have a manager with proven ability to continually unearth excellent players, I would not have made my original post. I certainly would not have suggested it under the stewardship of any of the 4 mentioned above.

If I were John Williams I would be giving Mark Hughes this option. If he doesn't want to take it, fine. However, if he is as frustrated as the television interview that prompted my original post suggested, then he would likely take the opportunity to get back in to the market.

To continually dismiss the idea purely because "lolz, selling our best playas is bad, innit" doesn't really help.

[den]

If we did not have a manager with proven ability to continually unearth excellent players, I would not have made my original post.

Toogs, if I believed that, I would back you all the way. It isn't proven that he can continually unearth excellent players though, is it? He's said himself that he can't continue to unearth gems. That can't be the way forward unless you're crewe, who run their club making profit by selling players. They know though, that they do that at the cost of continual lower league football, - they see that as the way for Crewe to survive. With a policy of selling players, that's all you can do - survive. That's also why they get abysmally low gates [4000 last week against Leeds, their biggest gate of the season], because their fans know that the club lacks real ambition.

[T4E]

Toogs, if I believed that, I would back you all the way. It isn't proven that he can continually unearth excellent players though, is it? He's said himself that he can't continue to unearth gems.

I agree. Thats the whole point though, isn't it? He cannot continue to unearth gems spending £400k here and £750k there. We must give him the opportunity to spend more and see what he can really do. Given his record on a shoestring budget, if he leaves the club without ever being given a real chance to spend properly, it will be a travesty.

[gumboots]

The problem is that what you say may make economic sense; it might even be in the best interests of the club from a financial point of view, but it doesn't feel good. We don't want to sell because we remember what it felt like to sell Duff, and I know the time wasn't of our choosing but the cash was a fortune at the time. Others remember what it felt like to sell Shearer and again although the timing wasn't of our choosing the money was good. There's no guarantee that any player you bring in settles into your team and club as well as the outgoing one even if they're a good player and so nobody wants to rock the boat. The player has shown no signs of wanting to leave at the moment and so I don't think with your perfectly logical ideas you're going to win over many fans because football can't always be about logic because it touches on too many people's hopes and dreams

[tony gale's mic]

The problem is that what you say may make economic sense; it might even be in the best interests of the club from a financial point of view, but it doesn't feel good. We don't want to sell because we remember what it felt like to sell Duff, and I know the time wasn't of our choosing but the cash was a fortune at the time. Others remember what it felt like to sell Shearer and again although the timing wasn't of our choosing the money was good. There's no guarantee that any player you bring in settles into your team and club as well as the outgoing one even if they're a good player and so nobody wants to rock the boat. The player has shown no signs of wanting to leave at the moment and so I don't think with your perfectly logical ideas you're going to win over many fans because football can't always be about logic because it touches on too many people's hopes and dreams

exactly.

[RevidgeBlue]

Bentley is certainly no Shearer and imo is not even anywhere near as good as Duff was at his peak with us.

I don't want to see him go but he is very inconsistent, one good game, two poor ones.

If someone offered us what I consider silly money (15m?) I'd personally be struggling to find reasons to turn it down.

Hopefully no-one will.

[92er]

The problem is that what you say may make economic sense; it might even be in the best interests of the club from a financial point of view, but it doesn't feel good. We don't want to sell because we remember what it felt like to sell Duff

...............and some of us remember sellimg Fred Pickering.

It is not easy to replace your best players.

[92er]

Reid is one of the few that still passes to Ped but I guess he's still a bit rusty from all that time on the treatment table.

Bentley also passes to him; indeed MGP usually plays best when Bentley is in his free role and brings him into play.

[den]

Well, you can sell all our best players if you like. Personally I'd stick with the revolutionary idea of keeping them - then buying one or two more to play alongside them.

Can't see that idea catching on though. Ferguson, Wenger, Moyes, Rednapp, O'Neill would never go down that route.