Gettin’ Guehi with it

[Squiggles]

I'm not overly passionate eitherway, but on balance I'd sell and replace Konate if the right offer comes in, and I say that as one of his fan-boys and staunchest supporters.

Firstly because I really dislike losing players for free. £35M for one season of Konate values him at £140m over a four year deal. We know at the best of times he's worth half that. We recoup what we paid with one year left on his deal. That's good going. Also, the more we release players for free, especially to Real Madrid, the more they'll keep coming back for more. Secondly, Guehi is well established in the Premier League and I'd be confident can get up to speed quickly, meaning we have £35-40M to put toward a young, promising CB that is invested in playing for us. We also know that any CB looks fifty percent better than they are playing alongside VVD. Thirdly, there's still a decent risk that Konate spends 4-8 weeks on the sidelines and has another mixed year at the club. He's had his best year at the club, and them some, but another year with fucked knees remains a possibility. Is that worth £35-40M? Maybe, maybe not.

If an offer comes in for Gomez then I'd sell and replace him long before Konate, but the bottom line is I have in Ward/Edwards to identify a decent CB for £35M. If Real Madrid or PSG come in with less than that it's a different conversation. At that point then we may as well try and flog Gomez for whatever we can and find a CB that can keep themselves fit and worry about Konate next year.

 

[Woland]

Yeah, would you loan him for a year for 40m? Would you fuck

 

[Frogfish]

From a fans view that's true, but not from a business one.

PSG made £121.7m from wining the CL in 2025. City made £176m from winning the PL in 2023/4 (of course 2nd, 3rd, 4th and down still made a huge number).

Plus there are all sorts of other revenue streams that PL or CL winners can benefit from. Additionally for the following year the club benefits from a higher UEFA coefficient rankings, automatic CL entry for the following year and additional TV rights. From a business perspective it seems clear cut.

 

[Frogfish]

It kind of is.

It’s a risk vs reward kind of thing based on known and unknowns.

We know how good Konate is and what he brings to the team - and if he continues to play at the level he did last season, brings a better and less riskier chance we’ll win a major trophy that will add more than his sale value to the books.

Re-signing Konate AND bringing in Guehi would be the best strategy by far.

Losing Konate on a free AND signing Guehi, giving him a year to fully integrate, then signing another CB in a years time would be the second best decision.

Both, imho, would be better decisions that selling Konate and bringing in Guehi AND another CB at the same time.

Of course, all of it is outcome dependent, but the best strategy for the “business” should be to win things or get as far into the CL as you can while mounting a league title challenge, because that increases income.

All of the above. In spades.

 

[Dreambeliever]

Konate doesn’t strike me as a player who would be happy to rotate, earn his spot or be overly rested in favour of a replacement so keeping him if he’s leaving on a free next year is risky. Not to mention the fact he might drop off a cliff form wise like Trent did.

 

[StevieM]

Konate doesn’t strike me as a player who would be happy to rotate, earn his spot or be overly rested in favour of a replacement so keeping him if he’s leaving on a free next year is risky. Not to mention the fact he might drop off a cliff form wise like Trent did.

Trent was still widely regarded as one of the best FB’s in the league - any form drop off could be attributed to injury issues.

Konate tends to have little periods of being injured - when Guehi would start - then it would be up to Konate to force his way back in. I look at it more like Guehi being a Matip replacement when him and Konate would be more interchangeable.

The other bonus is that Konate & Guehi, who despite playing on the left is predominantly right footed, are or should be comfortable playing either right or left CB - which means we should be able to give Virgil more of a break in games should we want to give him a few league games off. (note to Dreamie, didn’t play in EFL Cup till semi-finals and didn’t feature at all in FAC).