Middlesbrough poised for quality capture

Premiership side Middlesbrough have agreed on fee with Championship side Charlton Athletic for defender Luke Young. The quoted fee of 2.5m is an excellent price for a talented defender.

Young must now agree on personal terms and pass a medical exam. Hemade it clear he wanted to stay in the Premiership and Charlton have now relented. The 28 year old had played over 200 matches for the club and was voted Charlton’s player of the year in 2005, the same year he received his first England call up.

Before Alan Curbishley left Charlton Athletic, Young had handed in a transfer request, since he and Curbishley had not got on. After Curbishley left Young withdrew his transfer request, but this time a transfer looks for real as Alan Pardew said he would not prevent Young from leaving The Valley.

Yassin Moutaouakil, a new signing, should replace Young at the full back’s position.

Transfer market? Oh, you would have thought it was the rip-off market

Tottenham have signed England striker Darren Bent from new Championship outfit Charlton and have wildly overpaid. The final negotiated price was 16.5m pounds which is more than Barcelona paid for Thierry Henry. For the Premiership club, the price tag is a club record.

This clears the way for a Jermain Defoe exit at what will probably be a reasonable fee. If I were Charlton, I’d feel like someone forgot their bag of money on my seat at the ground. If I were Tottenham, I’d be opening my wallet, seeing the darkness and wonder where the hell the kitty is for a left sided winger.

Spurs had previously offered a reasonable 12m for Bent, even at that price he was full value but Charlton decided to treat the transfer as silly money and demand the 17m fee West Ham United offered until Bent refused to go. West Ham pulled a Chelsea, if that offer were never made you can rest assured that Charlton would have had very little reason to stick by their guns but being able to say “hey, West Ham thought it was fair value” they were able to keep the price tag on the table.

Bent’s deal is for up to 6 years. The 23-year-old passed a medical yesterday; the transfer fee will be paid in installments. Visa and MasterCard then, cha-ching.

On the bright side, this does give Dimetar Berbatov pause as they paid significantly less for him. He must wonder what he is really worth. If I were Spurs, break out the Visa again, give Dimetar a raise.

On the bright, bright side, this transfer fee will do nothing but stall the transfer market as prices across the board have just risen on the news that a player that has 3 caps could command such a fee.

On the positive side, Bent was in excellent form last season scoring 15 goals. That many goals means on a good team he would have scored 20+. If he can produce like that at Tottenham we will all look back and say wow… Jol has a vision. But, in my opinion there are too many like Angel, Barros and Shevchenko to warrant the risk. But Jermain Defoe scored 18 last season. Hmmmm.

On the positive, positive side, Charlton have just reaped a windfall profit of 15m pounds as they only paid 2.5m for Bent in 2005. They have to pay Ipswich 20% of that because of a sell on clause but are still 12+ million in the clear.

Bent on a price: a never ending saga

You’d think 16m pounds is good enough, considering that’s what Henry’s transfer fee was, but no. Charlton Athletic are insisting that the only acceptable sale price for Darren Bent is 17m pounds. Tottenham must have their hands in the air at this point, and if I were them, I would give up.

In my view, the price is inflated to begin with. Darren Bent is talented, but not 17m pounds talented. I always felt a price of 12m pounds was more than enough, but wealthier men disagree with me. If I were Tottenham I would save my money because I think they are ok up front with Berbatov/Keane/Defoe. Darren Bent would be a nice to have, but at these top dollar prices they are half a step from the Fernando Torres’s and Samuel Eto’o’s of the world. Even Michael Owen or Obafemi Martins would be better value, in my opinion.

Some reports say have stated that Tottenham have ended the negotiations, probably not true, but Tottenham should send a shot across the bow to the Addicks and start shopping for other strikers. Bent won’t just go where he’s told (rejected West Ham) and not everyone has 17m to toss out for the player. Charlton will bend on Bent, but Tottenham tend to be a bit trigger happy at times in the transfer market.

A meeting of the Charlton board stated that:

"It's 17m or no go"

I’d say no go then. The valuation is way over the top. Charlton’s poker game could easily end up backfiring. In fact, it should. We are not playing with Monopoly money.

The Ben Thatcher hatchet job

Charlton Athletic defender Ben Thatcher is lucky (for the FOURTH time) that he didn’t end a career, even a life. When he was with Manchester City he floored Pedro Mendes so violently that afterwards the Portsmouth midfielder laid completely knocked out and had a seizure and needed oxygen on the way to the hospital.

The Mendes incident took place in August 2006, and you’d think he had learned a lesson before then because this was not the first time. Thatcher is a dirty player. Not only did he knock Mendes into the advertising boards Thatcher also elbow had hospitalized an opponent during a pre-season tour of China.

Before the incident in China, he made similar challenges against Nicky Summerbee when he was with Wimbledon against Sunderland and Allan Nielsen from Tottenham Hotspur.
See the horror challenge here, what makes me gag most is his ‘what, me?’ reaction in anger afterwards:

See the entire worst moments in football series

Charlton sign one of U-21 Tournament’s best defenders

Charlton Athletic have been preparing for life in the Championship by signing Portuguese U-21 International central defender Jose Semedo. If you didn’t have a chance to see him at the tournament he was very impressive, hardly putting a foot wrong through all the games and showing exceptional skill and athletic prowess for his age.

Charlton have definitely done well as Alan Pardew continues to build a new squad ahead of his attempt to rebound to the top flight.

A powerful central defender, Semedo reminds me a lot of Kolo Toure and Marcel Desially when you watch him. He has never actually played in the Sporting Lisbon first team having spent his youth there and being loaned out since 2004 to Casa Pia AC and then CD Feirense in the Second Division in Portugal and then to Cagliari in Italy. It’s incredible how many talented players are coming out of the Sporting youth academy, it goes another step towards cementing its place as the second best in the world behind Ajax Amsterdam.

Semedo has signed a four-year deal and follows another Under-21 starlet, Frenchman Yassin Moutaouakil, to the club. Luckily Charlton get him on a free transfer, Sporting having slipped on the contractual front.

I will stop short of raving, but this player has tremendous potential and I am certain will do exceptionally well at Charlton. I couldn’t find a video, so you’ll just have to wait and see.