Garry Cook on transfer matters

Gary Cook, in speaking of the clubs attempts in the transfer market commented on a number of business points:

“Contrary to many opinions it is harder for us to do business. That’s because the expectations are so high and people look at the finances resources as the ticket to success.

“That’s truly not the case – the ticket to success is being able to give football fans a return on the money that they invest in this Club.

“That’s going to involve putting great players out on the football pitch and giving them a great experience when they come to the games.

“We’ve also said it’s not just about getting great players here, obviously that’s a part of it, but it’s also about the Academy.

“I was at Portsmouth last week watching us in the FA Youth Cup and they put on a great performance. We’ve got some great lads in there and that’s nice.

“When you work that with sitting down trying to bring Kaka to the Club that’s a balance we’d like to see.”

Of negotiations, he stated emphatically that:

“We are not anybody’s fool.

“We are finding it very difficult because the expectation that is set by the public space of who we are and what we represent is not truly who we are or what we represent. So we have to get to a point where we understand which players are required and we then have discussions.

“I’ve been in discussions that are completely ludicrous [during the transfer window] and I actually flew to another country to have a meeting which lasted seven minutes.

“And that seven minute meeting was because the demands were so ridiculously high, I just packed up my bags and walked out because he clearly was not coming to our football club for the right reasons.”

Of future plans, he added:

“We’ve got some great players here and we’re on a bit of a run with seven points from the last three league games so we want to continue that and adding strength to the squad is only going to enhance us.

“We had very clear plans going into it. We’re ticking the boxes as we say.

“We’ve not been successful on all fronts and we’ve rejected an awful lot because the negotiating process again became ridiculous.”

Returning to the to Kaká situation he noted:

“They are extremely pragmatic and they know that truth is your ally.

“We said nothing about the Kaka interaction with Milan while it was going on and they chose a very different plan. It affected their ability to negotiate.

“We didn’t want to be in a public space, having a public discussion about this, they chose a different way to do it. We’re going to stay true to what we believe and the owners are learning that not everybody has the same integrity and honesty that they do.

“We forget that our owners have been here for 16 weeks and we keep talking about a 10-year dynasty. This Club’s been here for over a hundred years and it will be here for a hundred plus more.

“On that journey we know what we’re looking at. Over the next four windows we have got a clear list of players that we’d like to see at this football club. So where the public space, that we choose not to get in to allows itself to be speculative, we clearly know what we’re doing and I think that the fans are going to be excited.”