Lacroix

[Nathan Towne]

People have complained that Palace (or Chelsea) have used Van Hecke as the benchmark and consider Max as far better - but is he? or is it a case that the Dutch player played for our bitter South Coast rivals and, therefore, must be worse? He does have 16 caps for the Dutch and on the rare occasions I've seen him play, he looks decent enough.

My gripe with the fee (if it is £52m) is the difference in contract length remaining - V-H's was apparently 1 year and Max is 3. I would have hoped for more on that basis alone. Having said all that, we bought Max just 2 years ago for £18m including add-ons and have basically tripled our investment in pure transfer fee terms. That's not a bad result.

A bit concerned about the quality of the team heading into the season though.

 

[StandbyPalace]

A while back I saw a journalist on Sky I think express their thoughts about Palace transfer strategy and posed the question as 'why do Palace keep getting rid of their best players - they got rid of Olise, Eze and Guehi, why?'

They seemed genuinely dumbfounded. But the answer is, and not frequently stressed on these type of threads, that the players wanted to go. Olise wanted to go. Eze wanted to go. Guehi wanted to go. And now Lacroix wants to go.

The clubs job is to try and get the best fee possible for them but them leaving is inevitable.

I am disappointed losing Lacroix, especially since he's gone to Chelsea who aren't even in Europe and they are a graveyard of many a career. The fee is low and we don't know if there are contract terms but it seems obvious that there isn't a more prestigious club willing to offer more than Chelsea so hard to get a higher fee.

Lacroix has been beyond great for us. It might be getting used to the new international environment but he did not look very good for France at the World Cup. Overall if he is the only departure I'd probably be ok with it. If we lose Wharton this summer I'll be seriously depressed.

Overall it's a shame to lose Max but much more important that we up our game on recruitment.

Exactly its not rocket science, the players wanted to leave its not the club pushing them out. The club has to take a view if the contract is running down though. It must be very difficult to always find the right soluton for the club as there is the player, players agent, other clubs involved as well.

 

[Elwissthebest]

By any standards, £52m for Lacroix is disappointing for Palace. We are such a soft touch in the transfer market. Olise, Eze, Guehi and now Lacroix. If it's true that all these wanted 'to leave Palace', can we please sign someone who wants to stay? Failing that, can players at least refrain from 'kissing the badge' when it's clear that a more sincere gesture would be to kiss their bank manager's backside?

 

[DenTyler]

Definitely. It's disappointing because as well as his play he felt like a proper Palace man.

We all need to get used the the fact that there will never be a 'Palace Man' again. Sir Joel Ward will have the honour of being the last great Palace Man. We are a good club for players to join, make a name for themselves and then move on. We are never going to be big enough to keep our players long term and lets face it the players will go to the best place for there career and money. Who can blame them.

What we can do is get the best out of them and remember them for what they did. The turn coat Glasner years were beyond all our expections and we had and amazing team for awhile. What we can hope is that Sage produces another spell with what he has to work with and so the circle goes round.

Knowing this after Eze and Captain Marvel last season, I enter this new year with a sort of calmness knowing exactly what we are. If we bomb out the league and end up playing Bolton or Stoke on a Tuesday night... so be it (but I dont for a second think that will happen because I actually trust Parish who is a Palace Man) and nobody but nobody will ever take away May 17th 2025. That is etched in my brain and will be forever.

 

[Elwissthebest]

We all need to get used the the fact that there will never be a 'Palace Man' again. Sir Joel Ward will have the honour of being the last great Palace Man. We are a good club for players to join, make a name for themselves and then move on. We are never going to be big enough to keep our players long term and lets face it the players will go to the best place for there career and money. Who can blame them.

What we can do is get the best out of them and remember them for what they did. The turn coat Glasner years were beyond all our expections and we had and amazing team for awhile. What we can hope is that Sage produces another spell with what he has to work with and so the circle goes round.

Knowing this after Eze and Captain Marvel last season, I enter this new year with a sort of calmness knowing exactly what we are. If we bomb out the league and end up playing Bolton or Stoke on a Tuesday night... so be it (but I dont for a second think that will happen because I actually trust Parish who is a Palace Man) and nobody but nobody will ever take away May 17th 2025. That is etched in my brain and will be forever.

Yes, but how do we get to the next stage and become a club that can retain its best players. Or will that never be? Agree about Glasner, the Jekyll and the Hyde...

 

[JHB]

By any standards, £52m for Lacroix is disappointing for Palace. We are such a soft touch in the transfer market. Olise, Eze, Guehi and now Lacroix. If it's true that all these wanted 'to leave Palace', can we please sign someone who wants to stay? Failing that, can players at least refrain from 'kissing the badge' when it's clear that a more sincere gesture would be to kiss their bank manager's backside?

Are we really a soft touch? We acquired Lacroix two year’s ago for around £18m and are selling him on for almost three times that. Sold Anderson for £25m which in retrospect looks like great business. Purchased Eze for £17m and sold him for £60m plus add ons. Sold Guehi for £30m when he could have left for nothing 6 month’s later. That doesn’t look especially ‘soft’ to me.

Where we are open to criticism is that when we pay relatively big money our record isn’t great so far. Generally though we’ve been pretty good at getting value for departing players.

 

[JHB]

Yes, but how do we get to the next stage and become a club that can retain its best players. Or will that never be? Agree about Glasner, the Jekyll and the Hyde...

Simply put we don’t get to the next level assuming that is regular European football and challenging for Champions League places. Since the Premier League started only two teams have got to the next level in Man City and Chelsea. In City’s case they were purchased by an oil state as a sports washing project. In Chelsea’s case they were purchased by a now sanctioned Russian billionaire who is close to a dictator and war criminal for reasons that remain extremely murky. Both of them allegedly breached financial and transfer rules to gain success. In other words even with that money they are alleged to have had to cheat.

In both cases the financial rules have now been changed to make it impossible for it to happen again.

 

[Linford]

We all need to get used the the fact that there will never be a 'Palace Man' again. Sir Joel Ward will have the honour of being the last great Palace Man. We are a good club for players to join, make a name for themselves and then move on. We are never going to be big enough to keep our players long term and lets face it the players will go to the best place for there career and money. Who can blame them.

What we can do is get the best out of them and remember them for what they did. The turn coat Glasner years were beyond all our expections and we had and amazing team for awhile. What we can hope is that Sage produces another spell with what he has to work with and so the circle goes round.

Knowing this after Eze and Captain Marvel last season, I enter this new year with a sort of calmness knowing exactly what we are. If we bomb out the league and end up playing Bolton or Stoke on a Tuesday night... so be it (but I dont for a second think that will happen because I actually trust Parish who is a Palace Man) and nobody but nobody will ever take away May 17th 2025. That is etched in my brain and will be forever.

I do think Mitchell is a "Palace Man", and even though he left for much of his career I do believe Clyney was too.

Deano also just "gets it".

We did indeed have a lot more players in the past who you could say, without tinted glasses, had the club in their hearts. Wardy, Delaney, Kelly, Jedinak, McCarthy, Digcakoi, Ambrose, Speroni, Puncheon, Gayle, Bamford etc.

Part of levelling up is losing a bit of that realness unfortunately. Still I recon there is a little bit of it still kicking around the place.

 

[Linford]

Are we really a soft touch? We acquired Lacroix two year’s ago for around £18m and are selling him on for almost three times that. Sold Anderson for £25m which in retrospect looks like great business. Purchased Eze for £17m and sold him for £60m plus add ons. Sold Guehi for £30m when he could have left for nothing 6 month’s later. That doesn’t look especially ‘soft’ to me.

Where we are open to criticism is that when we pay relatively big money our record isn’t great so far. Generally though we’ve been pretty good at getting value for departing players.

50 mil for Olise was a joke, same as 50 mil for Lacroix is.

 

[pssguy]

We did indeed have a lot more players in the past who you could say, without tinted glasses, had the club in their hearts. Wardy, Delaney, Kelly, Jedinak, McCarthy, Digcakoi, Ambrose, Speroni, Puncheon, Gayle, Bamford etc.

Part of levelling up is losing a bit of that realness unfortunately. Still I recon there is a little bit of it still kicking around the place.

In his case, the club in his heart was definitely not Palace

 

[stringmail]

Teams must be overjoyed when contacting Palace about player X. It has to be a pleasure to know there is relatively no negotiation. Comparing contracts with 1 year remaining to 3 years remaining for arguably similar players is preposterous. Someone inquires and we simply bend over.

What Palace have previously paid has nothing to do with the current sale and the challenge becomes undervaluing our assets and then overvaluing the potential new acquisition.. There is a lot of pressure on Hobbs to acquire the assets that allow Sage to develop a competitive team.

I have so little confidence in Hobbs that the start of every season is always anxiety inducing with the understanding off all the success the team has recently earned. It would be so nice to not finish in the 12-16 table range and finish in the top 10 but I won't be surprised when we are in the relegation battle. Par for the course as a Palace fan but I really hope we start the season solid against the toughish schedule. Focus is now is beat Everton...once.

 

[palace99]

Ultimately, we don't know what's happening behind the scenes with these people, or what they are like. We didn't know what the story was with Sam Johnson when we bought Henderson, for example, and we don't know what's been happening with Lacroix.

Perhaps he's a nightmare, kicking off left right and centre to make the move happen.

Perhaps he's happy to stay but the club wants to sell someone to increase the transfer budget, and they consider Lacroix easier to replace than the other key saleable assets.

Perhaps there has always been a gentleman's agreement that he can go if clubs of a certain level come in for him.

It seems highly unlikely in this case, but perhaps he's shagged another players wife. Or one of them has shagged his. Or shagged him. Christ knows.

We only see it from the outside.

He's been at the WC for the last month and then has a 3 week break before he can return to training so if he's been kicking off it's not impacted the club or the players as he's not been anywhere near the training ground.

I think the gentleman's agreement relates to every player we sign - play well for us and if in 2 or 3 years a decent offer comes in we'll not stand in your way.

Having said that the timing and the fee are negotiable. We don't have to accept the first offer a player receives.

 

[pssguy]

Teams must be overjoyed when contacting Palace about player X. It has to be a pleasure to know there is relatively no negotiation. Comparing contracts with 1 year remaining to 3 years remaining for arguably similar players is preposterous. Someone inquires and we simply bend over.

I have so little confidence in Hobbs that the start of every season is always anxiety inducing with the understanding off all the success the team has recently earned. It would be so nice to not finish in the 12-16 table range and finish in the top 10 but I won't be surprised when we are in the relegation battle. Par for the course as a Palace fan but I really hope we start the season solid against the toughish schedule. Focus is now is beat Everton...once.

Well we didn't bend over for Zaha amd Arsemal and that arguably cost us. I had hoped that with Saliba's injury and the Rogers gazumping, Arsenal would come in for Lacroix but no such luck and I guess we need the money after the January fiasco

BTW, we have never finished 16th in the Premier League, and have managed 10th on two occasions

 

[RubinsCube]

I understand the point, but what in truth is a Palace man?

The most vociferous players in terms of celebrating with the fans, fist pumping and waving of arms are Mateta and Lacroix- and yet both want out.

Perhaps a better example of a Palace man is Mitchell, a true consistent competitor who goes about his work in an understated way never (ostensibly) complaining or seeking to hog the limelight.
In his own way he’s equally as effective as Lacroix or Mateta.

With regard the supposed £52 million fee for Lacroix, coincidentally this seems to be the same fee as Spurs paid for Van Hecke from Brighton.
Let’s hope it’s not a case of using that as a benchmark for a centre back.
Van Hecke is a decent player, but he’s not at the same level as Lacroix who also has 3 years remaining on his contract as opposed to Van Hecke’s one year.

I can only assume there must be some sort of release clause in the Lacroix contract which didn’t even require it to be a Champions League club coming in for him.

In my head they come in different guises.

Guehi, Lacroix, Henderson, Jedinak, Delaney, Cannon types who get the club, get the fans, and give the impression of how I as a fan might feel celebrating or fighting for the club I love.

Ward, Mitchell, McArthur, Clyne, Derry, Simon Rodger, Geoff Thomas types who have longevity of service and leave it all out on the pitch every game.

Bright, Lombardo, Andy Johnson, Zaha, Eze, Olise types who get the crowd on their feet, win us games and enjoy those moments with the crowd and their team mates.

Academy products (Wan-Bissaka; Routledge; Southgate) who are "one of our own".

Some fit more than one category (Rodger, Bright, Cannon, Zaha). I think Zaha is one of the few that ticks them all.

The third category is why Ian Wright's apathy towards Palace is such a sore one for so many fans.

 

[Nathan Towne]

We all need to get used the the fact that there will never be a 'Palace Man' again. Sir Joel Ward will have the honour of being the last great Palace Man. We are a good club for players to join, make a name for themselves and then move on. We are never going to be big enough to keep our players long term and lets face it the players will go to the best place for there career and money. Who can blame them.

What we can do is get the best out of them and remember them for what they did. The turn coat Glasner years were beyond all our expections and we had and amazing team for awhile. What we can hope is that Sage produces another spell with what he has to work with and so the circle goes round.

Knowing this after Eze and Captain Marvel last season, I enter this new year with a sort of calmness knowing exactly what we are. If we bomb out the league and end up playing Bolton or Stoke on a Tuesday night... so be it (but I dont for a second think that will happen because I actually trust Parish who is a Palace Man) and nobody but nobody will ever take away May 17th 2025. That is etched in my brain and will be forever.

Zaha was clearly a Palace man.

 

[Charles]

Mitchell could yet qualify as a Palace man; Roy didn't expect us to keep him any longer than wan Bissaka.

 

[Paul Salvage]

Yes, but how do we get to the next stage and become a club that can retain its best players. Or will that never be? Agree about Glasner, the Jekyll and the Hyde...

We will never get to the stage where we can retain our best players. The corruption within the league and financial status simply will not allow it.
Far bigger clubs than us have to sell their best players to meet the financial requirements that the league impose. This is all done to keep the top 6 happy and keep the tv money rolling in.

All we can do is hope to keep finding players like Olise, Eze, Mark, Wharton and enjoy them whilst they are with us, make a few quid, and also hope that they bring some success along the way.

This is truly not a reflection on Palace. Yes it is frustrating but in reality it will never change.

 

[McAhuna]

In my head they come in different guises.

Guehi, Lacroix, Henderson, Jedinak, Delaney, Cannon types who get the club, get the fans, and give the impression of how I as a fan might feel celebrating or fighting for the club I love.

Ward, Mitchell, McArthur, Clyne, Derry, Simon Rodger, Geoff Thomas types who have longevity of service and leave it all out on the pitch every game.

Bright, Lombardo, Andy Johnson, Zaha, Eze, Olise types who get the crowd on their feet, win us games and enjoy those moments with the crowd and their team mates.

Academy products (Wan-Bissaka; Routledge; Southgate) who are "one of our own".

Some fit more than one category (Rodger, Bright, Cannon, Zaha). I think Zaha is one of the few that ticks them all.

The third category is why Ian Wright's apathy towards Palace is such a sore one for so many fans.

Being a local lad has to count for something. South London, Surrey or Kent.

A fair few on your list don't tick that box. But Zaha ticks that one too.

Even better if they supported Palace as a kid. Like Jason Puncheon.

 

[BromleyMonkey]

Even better if they supported Palace as a kid. Like Jason Puncheon.

And then the git scores a hat trick against us playing for Millwall, one of our own my arse 🤣

 

[Forest Hillbilly]

It's disappointing to lose your best players, especially when Palace are in a period of success. The only way it will stop, is if Palace were to have access to a bottomless money pit, and the financial wizardry employed by the top clubs.
Perhaps the start of works on the new stand will see further progression in Palace's status. Slow and sure.

Au Revoir Max. Thanks for the memories