Curbishly and Mitroglu

[colinwhite]

If the rumors are true that Alan Curbishly may come back again as Director of football , it strikes me that the question must be asked- who was responsible for the signing of Mitroglu ? This was possibly the worst decision ever in the clubs history Apart from maybe the sale of "supermac " to Luton for 17 thousand  by the maestro himself back in the day !

[Berserker]

I don't believe Curbishly was responsible. I think he may have been against it

[Lighthouse]

I don't know who is to blame. But looking at what has happened since then I think it is fair to say that those we were ready to blame might not be responsible after all. As our new owner seems to have shall we say, alienated the old guard. He then put the German manager in complete control. I would say that everyone from the MD down might have found themselves kept out of the loop as the owners men took over.

Mitroglu had more of the owners entourage hand in it then any of the old guard. The later decision to bring in the German manager was another error on HIS part.

[snarks]

I'm not sure the level of control over player purchases that Rene had, but as Tunnicliffe and Coles were clearly his choices, given his and their MU connections, it's likely Mitroglou was too.

It was only a bad signing because they bought him injured and then they appointed McGath, and very few (if any) experienced players wanted to play under his stewardship and control freakishness (not a real word I know). According to another thread Mitroglou picked up a second injury to the one he came with, and I do wonder if that was a "tactical" one to keep him away from the German.

[westcliff white]

As much of an issue as the Mitro signing was, and he clearly wasn't fit, I do not believe that Curbs was responsible, or Rene for that fact, he from memory seemed surprised we were able to sign him at all. Obviously looking back we could because he was severely injured.

He does seem to be playing reasonably well for Olympiakos though, so maybe there is hope after all ;)

[MasterHaynes]

If the rumors are true that Alan Curbishly may come back again as Director of football , it strikes me that the question must be asked- who was responsible for the signing of Mitroglu ? This was possibly the worst decision ever in the clubs history Apart from maybe the sale of "superman " to Luton for 17 mill by the maestro himself back in the day !

17 mill? wasn't it nearer 170k

[colinwhite]

No 17000 quid is what I of course meant !

[jags24]

Getting Mitroglou was seen as a coup, other teams wanted him, including West Ham, yes he had a minor injury at the time but then the greater injury, no it wasn't contrived, that's absurd, it just didn't work out is all.  Hindsight is 20/20.

[something_amusing]

I heard they had a choice between 3 strikers. One was the dutch/icelandic guy in the dutch league. Another was mitro and the third was another guy. The scouts were recommending icelandic guy but Kahn's son decided on mitro. Also heard Curbishley is a great guy and was actually offered the managers job but did not want it, so they offered him a job to help Rene.

[westcliff white]

The guy from the Netherlands was Finnbogason and we were refused permission to talk to him as we could not agree a fee. The player was told he could go for one amount which we apparently offered but however they wanted a lot more.

[ToodlesMcToot]

If the rumors are true that Alan Curbishly may come back again as Director of football , it strikes me that the question must be asked- who was responsible for the signing of Mitroglu ? This was possibly the worst decision ever in the clubs history Apart from maybe the sale of "superman " to Luton for 17 mill by the maestro himself back in the day !

Given how the Mitro situation worked out and the uncertainty of his own job (currently), does it make any sense for Kit to request/sanction his return if Curbs was the man responsible for signing the Greek?

[bill taylors apprentice]

If the rumors are true that Alan Curbishly may come back again as Director of football , it strikes me that the question must be asked- who was responsible for the signing of Mitroglu ? This was possibly the worst decision ever in the clubs history Apart from maybe the sale of "superman " to Luton for 17 mill by the maestro himself back in the day !

17 mill? wasn't it nearer 170k

Super Mac was dropped by the new manager Bill Dodgin, then sold by him in the close season after he had presided over our relegation to Div 3

[Deanothefulhamfan]

I think it was terrible business buying a foreign player who was injured, but the guy obviously has talent. We saw very little of it unfortunately, but if he had not got a worse injury, who knows what would have happened.

The club bought him on potential, rather than going for a tried and tested.... It didn't work out, and we never should have approached this option when players like Long were available. But I can't see why people say he was the worst buy ever, as we never got to see what he could do.

[colinwhite]

We paid 12 million for a player who was supposed to save us from relegation, and he fails to start a single match ,gets injured and looks like a pure donkey (the little we see of him ). It was the worst signing in the premier league last season and our worst of all time .
It would be interesting to know who was responsible , and Curbishly as director of football must surely have had some sort of say .
Even if Mitroglu was/is a worldbeater it was a catastrophic  decision .

[FPT]

Alan Curbishley wanted Alfred Finnbogason. Annoyingly, our €10m offer on deadline was rejected, and Heerenveen decided to sell for €7.5m in the summer (rising to €10m).

Though I don't think we'll ever know who were the main culprits behind this signing, I don't know why people are still crying about it. It's happened, you can't go back in time, lets move forward and learn from our mistakes - it was a gamble that didn't pay off.

[alfie]

We paid 12 million for a player who was supposed to save us from relegation, and he fails to start a single match ,gets injured and looks like a pure donkey (the little we see of him ). It was the worst signing in the premier league last season and our worst of all time .
It would be interesting to know who was responsible , and Curbishly as director of football must surely have had some sort of say .
Even if Mitroglu was/is a worldbeater it was a catastrophic  decision .

But it wasn't when we signed him, yes he had a slight injury, which healed as he played a couple of games for the u21's (I think) and scored a couple as well. His problems really started when on duty with Greece and he picked up a nasty injury that took a long while to heal, hardly his fault, it is a product of the game. From there onwards he was out of favour and never really got a chance to settle into the team.

[colinwhite]

Bill, I stand corrected about supermac, Dodgin sold him (17500 pounds) ,but it was Johnny that dropped him during his caretaker spell for no other reason than that he didn't like him , ( he had scored 6 goals in 8 games ) . No-ones perfect !

[res]

Bill, I stand corrected about supermac, Dodgin sold him (17500 pounds) ,but it was Johnny that dropped him during his caretaker spell for no other reason than that he didn't like him , ( he had scored 6 goals in 8 games ) . No-ones perfect !

Don't forget the 20plus goals Supermac scored for the reserves. Saw him score the only goal against Palace on his debut to end a 6 game Fulham goal drought, said that he would play for England one day, was stunned into total disbelief when he was dropped and then nearly gave up on our club when sold for a pittance. So we've had odd transfer dealings in the past.

[colinwhite]

I was at the palace game too . He wa just raw power and pace . We all saw it .

[GrahamG]

I remember a match against Blackburn (same season as the Palace game) when MacDonald stopped a (possibly) goal bound effort from Haynes and scored the goal himself. Haynes shouted at MacDonald in annoyance and presumably took his chance for revenge when he became manager.