Millwall is a magical club, at least in Aldridge's eyes.
Millwall hates Chelsea, even though Chelsea are far away in west London.
Although Aldridge is from East London, the Millwall club is in southeast London.
Geographically, West Ham United and Charlton are closer, as is Millwall. However, Millwall and West Ham United have become mortal enemies in the East London Derby. This goes back to the history of a hundred years ago.
And Millwall has a derby relationship with Crystal Palace in South London, and Millwall is involved in the south London derby. On the contrary, Charlton is sandwiched in the middle, no matter who they meet, the atmosphere of the derby is only a little bit.
Aldridge took the club's transfer team to south London, where Millwall's south London derby rival Crystal Palace won the League One title last season and will step onto the Premier League pitch in two months.
However, at this time, Millwall submitted a transfer offer to Crystal Palace.
The target is Gareth Southgate.
The first offer was for £1 million.
This offer did not receive a response from Crystal Palace, and I guess they scorned it.
Southgate is only 23 years old this year and is an excellent central defender. Although he is currently playing midfielder at Crystal Palace, he is the hero of Crystal Palace's promotion to the Premier League and has a background of Crystal Palace pedigree.
However, when the second offer of 2 million pounds was faxed to the Crystal Palace club, only half an hour passed before the other party responded.
5 million pounds!
Faced with such a reply, Aldrich smiled.
You are not afraid that the other party will open your mouth, but you are afraid that the other party will not counter-offer.
In the end, after some back-and-forth negotiations, Millwall's offer of £2.8 million made the Crystal Palace club surrender.
2.8 million pounds, this is even the worth of a top striker!
Is Southgate worth the price?
From a purely competitive perspective, it may not be worth it. Andy Cole, who can score 41 goals in a season, transferred to Newcastle United for only 1.75 million pounds, although next spring, his transfer to Manchester United will cost 6 million, setting a new transfer record.
But the value of current players has not yet been raised. The real value is of course the forwards who can score goals.
Aldridge bought Southgate for two reasons. One is that Southgate is young, capable of fighting, and will be the main member of the England national team in the future. There is a local international sitting in the team's locker room, and he is an Olympic player.
What Delic needs. Secondly, poaching rival stars is very beneficial to boosting the morale of the fans.
In the small apartment where Southgate lives in South London, Aldridge and Andrew came to interview Southgate in person.
Southgate knew Andrew, and he was just an acquaintance. Southgate was not enthusiastic about the arrival of the two Aldridge brothers. His wife poured tea for the two of them, and then left the living room to them.
Men.
Aldridge introduced himself and placed a contract in front of Southgate.
Southgate didn't look at it and said calmly: "Please come back. I have no interest in going to Millwall. A club that doesn't even have a head coach. I don't see any future."
"Head coach, yes, I am."
Aldrich said equally calmly.
Surprise flashed across Southgate's expression, and then he revealed a smile that was almost ironic.
He naturally thought Aldrich was joking. If it wasn't a joke, then it was nonsense.
Aldridge opened the contract, put it up in front of Southgate, and said calmly: "The weekly salary is 6,000 pounds. If the contract is successfully renewed, the salary will be increased to 8,000 pounds, and will increase by 10% year by year. In addition, according to the team
Bonuses will be given at the end of the ranking season. The contract period is five years.”
Southgate was stunned. He did not expect that the contract in front of him was so generous!
This is much more than the money he earned at Crystal Palace.
He was a little excited. Professional athletes eat the food of youth. Not only is their lifespan short during exercise, but they also come with risks such as injuries and other conditions.
It is human nature to make more money, and there is nothing to be noble about.
He still said slightly hesitantly: "Are you so young, head coach?"
Aldridge closed the contract document and put it on the table, looking at Southgate with uninterested eyes. Both of them were men about 1.85 meters tall, and neither of them was condescending.
"Gareth, I'm not here to beg you to join Millwall. I'm here in person to express my sincerity. Crystal Palace allowed you to transfer after receiving my offer of 2.8 million pounds. If it were me, I wouldn't
I will hypocritically say that players are priceless, but you, in my eyes, are at least 15 million pounds. I know your value. I also think you deserve this contract. I have a coaching qualification certificate. I don’t need to show it to you.
Look, I don’t have time to prove to you here whether I can coach the team. If time permits, I can demonstrate to you more than 20 corner kick tactics, more set-piece tactics, and sports offensive and defensive concepts. However, I am
Boss, I am the coach of the team. I don’t need to prove anything to you. My team is called Millwall, the most successful English team in the future. I don’t care what you are thinking. The opportunity is in front of you. If you miss it,
It’s your loss.”
Although Andrew kept a smile on his face, he was really worried about Aldrich in his heart.
Listening to Aldrich's tone, there is a sense of superiority, which is in line with the usual arrogance of the British.
Aldridge's indifferent expression also showed a confidence that was definitely not fake, which made Southgate stare at Aldridge for a long time before coming back to his senses.
In front of him, Aldridge has a temperament that is not like the kind of clown who talks nonsense. This kind of arrogance and confidence is sometimes what is needed most on the court and what a coach needs most.
Southgate thought for a moment and asked: "My status in the team?"
The other party was relieved. Aldridge said in a deep voice: "You will be my captain when you come to the team, but in the future, your position will change. In Crystal Palace, you played midfielder. When you came to Millwall, you played as a midfielder."
, you will be the main center back, believe me, I have video tapes of your performance throughout the season, and I know your role and strength better than you do."
Southgate was silent for a long time, and finally nodded in agreement.
When he left South London and got into the car, Andrew said in a daze: "This is the first time I have seen such a negotiation."
Aldrich sat in the passenger seat and said calmly: "I am the boss, I am the head coach. I don't need to look at anyone's face. If I beg players to come to my team, what authority do I have?"
"Haha, where will you go next?"
Andrew asked with a smile. He felt that his younger brother was starting to become a little more imposing.
Aldridge said casually: "Send me back to the club. I will stay in the club and you will work hard to run around. Your company should also take this opportunity to sign some players. It just so happens that I will give you a high salary.
Matchmaking, win-win.”
Andrew accepted the order happily. Although he had contacted Southgate before, when he contacted him, Southgate was already the main player of Crystal Palace, and the relationship was as light as water.
But on the list of players Aldridge wants to acquire, most of them have been in contact with Andrew in the past two years. It just so happened that Aldridge took advantage of the opportunity of recruiting players and high salaries, which also allowed him to officially take the step of becoming an agent.
Aldridge returned to Millwall and began sending faxes of transfer offers to clubs across Europe.
The team is tearing down and rebuilding, so he's networking talent from every position.
As for the goalkeeper, the club retained Casserly Keller. This player has some ability, but it cannot be said that he is not completely qualified to cope with the level of the Premier League, but he is certainly not a top goalkeeper.
Therefore, Aldrich approached the German second division team Oldenburg to purchase their young goalkeeper: Hans-Jörg Butt.
This future third goalkeeper of Germany has just been promoted to the team's first team. He only had two appearances in the Bundesliga 2 last season. Not to mention making a name for himself, perhaps even Oldenburg is still in the stage of testing his strength.
The quoted price is 100,000 pounds, which is a huge transfer for a small team, let alone a goalkeeper with no reputation or strength test.
Soon, the transfer of 20-year-old goalkeeper Bute was approved, and the final offer was 150,000 pounds.
Southgate has joined the central defender position, but Southgate's height of just over 1.8 meters is still insufficient for air defense. Aldridge directly sent a transfer to Cambre, who was relegated to the Dutch second division last season.
Will offer: £200,000 for center back Jaap Stam.
After raising the transfer price to 350,000 pounds, Millwall's negotiation team flew to the Netherlands to discuss contract terms with Stam.
Acquired 18-year-old Patrick Vieira from French AS Cannes for £100,000.
Perugia had just been promoted to the Italian Serie B and was in need of money. Aldrich took away their young player Gennaro Gattuso for 300,000 pounds, which made Perugia's president Salani laugh in front of the Italian media.
Aldrich is a fool.
Because Gattuso only signed a contract with Perugia a month ago, Perugia earned 300,000 pounds without spending almost a penny...
Michael Ballack, who was only 17 years old and had yet to sign a formal professional player contract, was directly lured to London by Andrew with a weekly salary of 3,000 pounds.
The transfer request for 1 million pounds directly shocked the chairman of Sparta Prague. Transfers in Eastern European football are naturally not as expensive as mainstream Europe, so Aldridge just raised the price to 1.2 million pounds, and Millwall
Got the opportunity to negotiate a transfer with Sparta Prague star Pavel Nedvěd.
If Andre hadn't been in contact with Nedvěd before he entered the first team of Sparta Prague, I'm afraid this transfer would have gone awry.
But the high salary given by Aldrich is enough for the stars to consider the pros and cons first.
It was not enough for Andrew to describe Aldrich's lofty ideas to Nedved. Aldridge personally expressed his sincerity after a phone call with Nedved, and took the initiative to include an automatic termination clause in his contract that would prevent him from being promoted next season.
, Nedvěd expressed his willingness to join, which can be regarded as an attempt to make a career in England. If it fails, it will be very cost-effective to leave after one year of making money.
Aldridge then offered the French club Metz £500,000 for Robert Pires.
300,000 pounds brought back 20-year-old Bernd Schneider from Jena of the German Second Division.
For 100,000 pounds, he took away 18-year-old Luca Toni from Italian Serie C team Modena.
For 350,000 pounds, he acquired from the Dutch club Den Bosch their youth training youngster, the 18-year-old king of the penalty area, Ruud van Nistelrooy.
200,000 pounds brought a 17-year-old French young man from Platense, Argentina, back to Europe. His name was David Trezeguet.
When Aldrich was about to leave for France to meet a friend, Andrew gave Aldrich another surprise.
Before 17-year-old Gianluca Zambrotta was about to sign with Como, he was abducted by Andrew and brought to London.
