You can take a horse to water but.....

It amuses me this argument about making players do this, or that. The players have ALL of the power these days and it doesn't matter what level they are playing at - non-league or Champions League, it's all the same. If a player wants to stay at his current club, and the club want him, then he signs a decent length of contract. No club, and I mean NO club, can force the issue. Footballers can be sullen, sometimes immature men (just like the rest of us) so, if they want to play then they will play. If they don't, they won't and no amount of big stick treatment will change that.

It's understandable that a player will want to secure his own and his family's future, the best way that he can. Some football fans (plenty on here) can't seem to grasp that, believing that the likes of Winnall and Hourihane and Bree are OUR property, therefore cannot be sold/given away. We all know that's not true though...don't we? Every player has a price and sometimes it's not what you or I think it should be.

Our club has apparently wasted a huge amount of money in recent years paying off average (or worse) players and managers and this needs to change. Maybe we are seeing the seeds of this better process now, maybe not. Seeing as I am not on the inside of my football club I will never know for sure. None of us will. All we can hope for is that the current custodians of the club keep things going, making steady progress and keep on turning up the odd gem of a player who has a decent sell-on value. If some of those go for peanuts, or for free, then we have to be philosophical and say "it was good seeing them for a while in a red shirt".

I'm just a Barnsley fan and that will do for me.

 

But what about Sanchez in 2013?

 

A player is property of the club while he is in contract. He can demand a move, kick up a fuss, get his agent to do whatever agents do, but he is still the property of the club until they agree to release him from it.

 

True, but these are delicate creatures and if they don't want to play, they won't play. The obvious answer then is to make them train with the kids and exclude them from the first team set up, but where is the good in that? A decent, money-making asset is then reduced to zero value.

Like it or not they have to be sold for the best profit. We need to get better at that but sometimes circumstances prevent it.

 

No idea what happened - remind me.