Many football fans will have allowed themselves to be side tracked this weekend with England back in action and a host of other international games (even rugby if that is in your wheelhouse) but plenty of Leeds United fans would have spent the last few days pouring over the thoughts and words of Managing Director Angus Kinnear.
A few days back the 46 year old sat down for quite an in depth interview with Square Ball podcast and one of the topics of conversation was the recent summer transfer window and the business Leeds did as we were preparing for life back in the Championship after last season’s extremely disappointing relegation. With some high profile departures and a fair number of loan deals, the best betting sites ireland would have had plenty of odds on who else may have departed over the summer, and Kinnear revealed that eight figure offers had also been levied for goalkeeper Illan Meslier, Luis Sinisterra and Pascal Struijk, but those bids had been rejected.
With an eye to balancing the books with reduced revenue given the riches at play in the Premier League, the £24 million sale of Tyler Adams to AFC Bournemouth, added to a further reduction on the wage bill with the likes of Robin Koch, Diego Llorente and Brenden Aarsonson all moving out on loan, that will certainly help and manager Daniel Farke did tinker with the squad and bring in a few new faces, but it very much sounds like we have tried to keep our powder dry here in the hope that we can return to the top flight at the first time of asking, and then keep the bulk of the squad together moving forward.
Speaking on the podcast, Kinnear confirmed that an offer of around £20 million came in for Colombian Sinisterra but it ultimately did not reach the valuation we had on the player, so his eventual loan to Bournemouth suited all parties as the 24 year old former Feyenoord talent did not want to drop into the second tier.
Meslier may well have moved on with us also bringing in more experienced stopper Karl Darlow, but a claimed bid of mid twenty millions was still not enough to tempt us into doing a deal for the French under 21 international.
Struijk apparently attracted an offer in the low teens from an unnamed club, but again it was not enough in terms of where we see their true valuation, and as we have seen since the new 2023/24 season has begun, both are now key players in Farke’s system and each with have their part to play in driving us towards the top of the table again, and hopefully achieving a very quick promotion and getting us back into the top flight.
Especially with the drop in revenue, and no guarantees that promotion can be earned quickly this season, many in the fan base may have thought new owners the 49ers would have cashed in, but in taking these decisions and postponing any real overhaul for at least the next 12 months may well have brought them some real credit amongst the faithful.
Now we just have to hope Farke’s plan for the year works.
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