Kieran Davies takes a stand against those who don’t yet are allowed to get away with it.

So with the football season fast approaching, most football fans will be wishing the transfer window to close quicker than a pop-up shop, that is unless you’re an Arsenal fan. Every football fan makes their first task of the day to trawl media sources to see what their clubs are supposedly doing. However, the stories emulating from the media seem to contain less and less factual information and just pure conjecture. It would be an interesting premise if before submitting their story these people had to take a lie detector test first. Some of the stories (some of which J.R.R. Tolkien would be proud of) contain so much fantasy it’s not going to be long before an article comes out about Luis Suarez  having to take a journey with a ring to Mordor to find his ‘precious’ which happens to be a loophole in his release clause!

Some would call the writers of these stories geniuses for drawing a salary from the smallest amount of fact. It’s getting to the stage that the daily articles thrust in our faces via various media sources are taken as seriously as the ‘your rumours’ section of most football transfer gossip sites in the last week of the transfer window. The creator of such enlightening snippets of information as……..Ronaldo spotted outside Old Trafford……..or………..Arsenal sign Bent…………despite the fact that Ronaldo is a Brazilian exchange student who’s looking for the University or that Islington Borough Council ensured the Arsenal sign was immediately fixed.  It’s no wonder any sensible fan takes these things with such a handful of salt until you see them in your club’s top stood in front of club’s badge in your ground. Imagine the irony if we applied the same work ethic to our daily jobs. “Clive, did you top up the hydraulic fluid on the brakes of that Audi?” “Yeh of course I did!” I can’t imagine that we would get away with it if I’m honest.

The might of the media is growing season by season. Sky Sports tell your team what time they will kick off if it’s their favoured game of the weekend. The stories about your star player leaving for pastures new will unsettle the player enough the next step is for them to force their own departure. In my eyes football clubs are too soft on these players. Football is real world, okay it doesn’t seem to get hit by the recessions most of the countries in the world are, but that is because your club is owned by the elite who haven’t and probably never will see a Tesco’s let alone their ‘value’ range. But contracts don’t seem to mean anything in football nowadays. In every other walk of life they have to be honoured but not in the multi-billion pound world of football. Now people will argue…….’you don’t want an unhappy player at your club……..or…….’what if just doesn’t try anymore’ but would this wash in other industry or world other than football? Footballers are assets to the owners of clubs and shouldn’t be forced to sell their assets by Gordon Taylor or any member of the PFA.

The days of the player who is fully committed to your club seems to have gone also. Liverpool fans need to enjoy the final stretch of Steven Gerrard’s career, Chelsea fans to soak in Frank Lampard’s last hoorah as a player and Manchester United fans need to absorb everything Ryan Gigg’s does in what will probably be his last playing contract……………these players are the final generation of a dying breed. Now all you have to look forward to is the foreign player who will tell you they will die for your club until something that ‘seems’ more attractive comes along and then they will wash their hands with you that quickly you will feel like Edward Snowden trying to get a passport.

Torres, Suarez, Rooney, Ronaldo, the whole of the Man City squad………..they only have one love, money. No doubt they will all say its Champions League football, winning trophies or a fresh challenge, it’s about as common as a roller skating unicorn to see a modern footballer take a pay-cut to go to another club. We need to change the way we look at these players and while we can admire their talents when plying their trade for your team, enjoy the moment as in today’s game they are about as permanent  as your current kit!

So next time you apply for annual leave and are turned down, or your boss won’t let you leave early or they don’t let you move to the other job you want, take a footballer’s approach……….sulk, look disinterested, tell lots of people about how unfairly you are being treated and who knows maybe Gordon Taylor will swoop into your office like some low rent superhero and pick your toys up and put them back in your pram and make sure you get your own way too!