Player watch: Christian Eriksen

[TheVoiceofReason]

I think that sadly this will become more and more common - with players running down their contracts and leaving clubs powerless.

By clubs, do you mean Spurs?

 

[slartibartfast]

[

Has he really? And you know this how?

Levy has more business acumen than anyone on this forum, yet so many seem to always know better than him.

Clearly, Levy is not an idiot. He would have done everything he could to get Eriksen tied to a new deal. He has done this successfully with countless of our players over the years.

Eriksen was not willing to sign a new contract. He set his stall out back in 2017/18, and had decided he wanted a new challenge in his career.

We tried to make him top earner, but Eriksen was not going to sign. He wanted to leave.

He was available this summer but no suitable bids came in from clubs he was willing to move to.

I don’t really know what else we were supposed to have done.

I think that sadly this will become more and more common - with players running down their contracts and leaving clubs powerless.

This is crap imo.
'Oh no! He wont sign a new contract and doesn't like any of the offers that came in. What are we to do? Help us Obi Wan. You're our ony hope.'
Or alternatively you can fkin man up and tell the little shit he either signs a new deal or fucks off. He's never playing in the starting 11 again.
They'll either sign or go. They wont spend a year doing nothing. They want to play and get in their national teams.
This idea that our hands were tied is utter shite imo.

 

[TheVoiceofReason]

He should have been training away from the squad 6 months ago. We’ve handed him his exit route on a silver platter.

 

[JayB]

[

This is crap imo.
'Oh no! He wont sign a new contract and doesn't like any of the offers that came in. What are we to do? Help us Obi Wan. You're our ony hope.'
Or alternatively you can fkin man up and tell the little shit he either signs a new deal or fucks off. He's never playing in the starting 11 again.
They'll either sign or go. They wont spend a year doing nothing. They want to play and get in their national teams.
This idea that our hands were tied is utter shite imo.

At what point would you have sidelined him? I can understand taking this view as of this past summer, but any earlier than that and it would have caused major problems. I don't think the other players in the dressing room would have been too thrilled with one of our most important players being treated in this way -- both out of solidarity for one another and given the fact that our form was totally dependent on him at the time. Jettisoning a would-be contract rebel two years before his contract is up would be very tricky to pull off in practice IMO.

 

[swarvsta]

[

This is crap imo.
'Oh no! He wont sign a new contract and doesn't like any of the offers that came in. What are we to do? Help us Obi Wan. You're our ony hope.'
Or alternatively you can fkin man up and tell the little shit he either signs a new deal or fucks off. He's never playing in the starting 11 again.
They'll either sign or go. They wont spend a year doing nothing. They want to play and get in their national teams.
This idea that our hands were tied is utter shite imo.

Give me an example of a situation in the last 5 years where a player has refused to sign a contract and the club told him he can rot in the reserves if he doesn’t sign?

You can’t hold people to ransom just because you want them to stay.

I am pretty sure such actions would risk employment law breaches or even worse.

This is real life, real people, real families. Some of you lot think it’s a game of Football Manager.

 

[ButchCassidy]

Give me an example of a situation in the last 5 years where a player has refused to sign a contract and the club told him he can rot in the reserves if he doesn’t sign?

You can’t hold people to ransom just because you want them to stay.

I am pretty sure such actions would risk employment law breaches or even worse.

This is real life, real people, real families. Some of you lot think it’s a game of Football Manager.

Not only that, most of the players are friends or at least friendly with each other. Start treating some of them like shit, the rest will be heading for the door because they know they'll be next. "Not signing an extension on the club's terms after two years of a five year contract" is clearly not a fireable offense.

 

[doctor stefan Freud]

Because for various reasons, Levy is confident he will get an improved offer - possibly even the full £20million he is looking for.

By holding firm for around 2 weeks, he will generate the club an extra £9million.

It’s called negotiating??‍

That always goes well

 

[tiger666]

This argument is only valid when we have some sort of leverage. In this situation, we do not. 11m or 14.5m or whatever is being reported now is a better deal than nothing in the summer. Anything 11m or above and we've made back what we paid for him plus profit. If we've really rejected an official bid of 11/14.5m and Inter says "sod it, we'll sign him in the summer" and we end up with an unhappy and underperforming player for another 5 months and lose him for nothing then it's horrible dealing by Levy.

I think I'll let Levy who has all the facts at his disposal be the judge of this. If he's still here in Feb, have a moan. I'm sure he'll go for the best price we can get. I don't see why there's desperation to get him out asap.

 

[spids]

Give me an example of a situation in the last 5 years where a player has refused to sign a contract and the club told him he can rot in the reserves if he doesn’t sign?

You can’t hold people to ransom just because you want them to stay.

I am pretty sure such actions would risk employment law breaches or even worse.

This is real life, real people, real families. Some of you lot think it’s a game of Football Manager.

The multi-millionaire would still get paid, so those points are not really valid.

The time to strong arm players is 18 months before the end of a contract. If they do not sign then you simply do not pick them. Danny Rose saying 'why should I leave when the manager keeps picking me' in the summer was a contributing factor to Poch getting the heave-ho IMO (interestingly Mourinho has not been picking him). Similar with Wanyama featuring in PL squads for us under Poch when we wanted him to leave.

With regards to Eriksen, based on form alone he should not have been picked for the last 8-12 months. Then add in he is effectively a free agent and not as committed as other players and he has to be left out. Of course, if he started putting his foot in, actually challenging for headers and managed to beat the first defender at a a corner once in a while then maybe he'd deserve a spot.

 

[Gassin's finest]

Give me an example of a situation in the last 5 years where a player has refused to sign a contract and the club told him he can rot in the reserves if he doesn’t sign?

You can’t hold people to ransom just because you want them to stay.

I am pretty sure such actions would risk employment law breaches or even worse.

This is real life, real people, real families. Some of you lot think it’s a game of Football Manager.

Toby Alderweireld

 

[Archibald-CPH]

Agreed

Got himself to blame though. If he had put in the kind of performances he is capable of, instead of the shite he’s produced over the last 12 months plus, then Madrid and Barca would be all over him.

I am of that opinion, that Dembele made room for Eriksen to shine. When Demebele left Eriksen felt below average. Eriksen needs a world class midfielder next to him. Which I thought Dembele was

 

[slartibartfast]

I am of that opinion, that Dembele made room for Eriksen to shine. When Demebele left Eriksen felt below average. Eriksen needs a world class midfielder next to him. Which I thought Dembele was

Not sure about that. They were better together obviously but better players make each other look better.
For example stick Kane in a shit team like now where he barely receives the ball in or around the box and he doesnt look as good either.

 

[slartibartfast]

Not only that, most of the players are friends or at least friendly with each other. Start treating some of them like shit, the rest will be heading for the door because they know they'll be next. "Not signing an extension on the club's terms after two years of a five year contract" is clearly not a fireable offense.

Nobody said it was.

 

[slartibartfast]

The multi-millionaire would still get paid, so those points are not really valid.

The time to strong arm players is 18 months before the end of a contract. If they do not sign then you simply do not pick them. Danny Rose saying 'why should I leave when the manager keeps picking me' in the summer was a contributing factor to Poch getting the heave-ho IMO (interestingly Mourinho has not been picking him). Similar with Wanyama featuring in PL squads for us under Poch when we wanted him to leave.

With regards to Eriksen, based on form alone he should not have been picked for the last 8-12 months. Then add in he is effectively a free agent and not as committed as other players and he has to be left out. Of course, if he started putting his foot in, actually challenging for headers and managed to beat the first defender at a a corner once in a while then maybe he'd deserve a spot.

Nail on head.
Nobody is talking about sacking anyone or breaking employment laws.
And if the rest of the squad know a player has been offered a lucrative deal but refuses to sign it and still doesn't want to be at the club then I'm extremely confident they wouldn't give a shit about getting him replaced.
The idea you have to let a player run down his contract and go on a free because you're worried you may upset other players is frankly laughable.

 

[nailsy]

Letting it get to where we are is an opportunity to bash Levy!
Its been total incompetence to let our squad get to the state where almost half your regular starting 11 are on the last year of their contract. Add to that not bringing in 1 single player in 2 windows when we had finally against all odds established ourselves as a regular top 4 team, well, what would you call it? Good business?
That said we could do a lot worse than Enic and Levy and he has done wonders for the club but the last 2 years have been nothing short of a cluster fuck that has set us back, possibly for a long time. The only good thing is Chelsea, Man U and Arsenal are also pissing in the wind recently.

It was three players, not five or six. Toby who Poch didn't want given a new contract, Jan who will be 33 this year and who looks to be on his last legs, and Eriksen who has turned down countless offers of a new contract.

[

This is crap imo.
'Oh no! He wont sign a new contract and doesn't like any of the offers that came in. What are we to do? Help us Obi Wan. You're our ony hope.'
Or alternatively you can fkin man up and tell the little shit he either signs a new deal or fucks off. He's never playing in the starting 11 again.
They'll either sign or go. They wont spend a year doing nothing. They want to play and get in their national teams.
This idea that our hands were tied is utter shite imo.

You can't do that. If you do he can use the Webster ruling to buy out the remainder of his contract and leave. If he did it with a year left on his contract we'd have got less than £4M for him.

 

[sausage]

Toby Alderweireld

It doesn't count just because we started playing like the reserves

 

[spursfan77]

Just hope Inter pay up soon. You'd hope having another £15-20m to play with will help us do some business this window.

It's an awfully low fee for a player of his abilities but in a time where the bosman is getting more and more frequent it would actually be a bit of a bonus, along with the fact he's going abroad (always a preference for me for outgoing players). I was convinced he'd see the season out until recently.

Yeah I think getting any money for him now is a great result. I fully expected him to leave for nothing in the summer. Any money needs to be reinvested immediately though (but that’s another problem).

 

[Gassin's finest]

It doesn't count just because we started playing like the reserves

We were still pretty good that season.

 

[punkisback]

Yes, we will progress from ‘keeping tabs’ to ‘considering a move for...’

Can't wait till we start "preparing a bid"

 

[yido_number1]

Yeah I think getting any money for him now is a great result. I fully expected him to leave for nothing in the summer. Any money needs to be reinvested immediately though (but that’s another problem).

I agree, if he goes the money needs reinvesting otherwise what is the point.