Long Time Lurker wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 12:02 amThat pretty much sums up my take on the situation, without the verbosity. I'm happy that Westwood is part of our team, but a new contract would have made me a lot happier.
Westwood is a quality player who fills an important role our squad. We did very well to get him off Villa for such a small sum of money. Active discussions about a new deal have probably been going on for some time and for that dialogue to end with the simple triggering of an existing contractual option is something of a disappointment. It is another tick in the box for getting the bare minimum done.
Bolstering his current contract with an additional year or two would have represented an outcome beyond the minimum expectation. Westwood is currently a first choice squad member and we look poorer without him on the pitch. I could understand the simple extension of an existing option if he was a backup player, but he isn't. His current performances aren't giving any indication that he won't continue to play at the same high level for a good number of years. In fact he is looking better and better. Taking that into account our apparent inability to convince him to commit extra years to us is a bit worrying.
At the moment we might be looking at a potential loss of 10-15m for Jeff, which is what we could have got for him in the Summer. Unfortunately, we didn't manage to sign a permanent midfielder early in the window and that gave us no room to consider a sale. It has put us in a position where the majority of the power is firmly in the hands of Hendrick and it is looking less likely he will sign a new contract.
If Jeff does sign a new contract he will no doubt want a healthy signing bonus to offset what he could get elsewhere as a free transfer and if he doesn't we will lose a very valuable asset for nothing. Losing the equivalent of 10-15m is the same as losing all our profit for the whole of last season and it could easily put a very big dent in what we have to spend next Summer. That is why I can't understand people being comfortable with the idea of Hendrick leaving.
If Hendrick leaves for nothing the only way I can see us balancing the books is by bringing in a player of equal stature ( who immediately gels with the squad ) on a free transfer. Should we fail to do that we will have to spend money if we don't want to go back to the risky three option midfield we were left with when Defour moved on. That could involve paying out a large sum to bring in a younger player or a smaller sum for another last contract clogger. The net result is that losing Jeff on a free transfer could see us spending a sizeable chunk of our available transfer budget for the next window on a player that will only " allow us to stand still " instead of using that money to generate forward movement.
On the face of it we could find ourselves back in the same position that we were in last Summer, despite the addition of Brownhill. Bringing in one midfielder and hoping Westwood will sign a new contract or trying to bring in two midfielders, which would allow us to sell Westwood and avoid another big financial loss. For those with very short term memories we failed to get even one permanent midfielder through the door last Summer despite a year of planning, never mind two.
Obviously, the players / agents have a big say in things and we can't force them to do anything they don't want to do, but I can't help feeling very disappointed that we have only managed to trigger an existing contractual option for an important player like Westwood.
The prospect of the same contractual circumstances associated with Jeff being repeating with another player so soon is troublesome. We can't afford to lose two established 10-15m players in subsequent seasons ( which could equate to our total profit for both of those seasons ), but that is what might happen in the aftermath of this " good news ".
In my opinion we are still paying a very heavy price for our poor performance in the last window. The only positive note is that without the fortunate ( and somewhat unexpected ) addition of Brownhill in the Winter window things could be looking even more precarious for the future of our midfield and our developing financial position.
I'm crossing my fingers this is just an interim position and that Hendrick and Westwood will go on to sign new contracts with us, even if it means paying them sizeable signing on fees to do so. That wouldn't be ideal, but our lack of any clear transfer strategy ( other than chasing unrealistic targets and putting out fires ) is making a rod for our own backs. What we really need are some sub 5m players we can polish over a year or two ( with time out on loan ) instead of looking at young 10-20m analytical headline grabbers who might be able to make an immediate first team contribution; relegating high wage earners to the bench if they can.
Totally agree on Jeff...great piece, our strength is the continuity we have had with our squad. I log on most days hoping to see JH signs contract extension.