Defoe would have been a brilliant signing. There’s no getting around that.
But he’s not going elsewhere because of money. If he’s going elsewhere it will be for alternative reasons. And frankly at his stage of his life he’s entitled to pretty much choose any reason he wants really.
If he’s moving for footballing reasons (selection), then are people really saying the club should have guaranteed him whatever he wanted, despite spending a lot of time and effort putting plans and structures in place? Or should we have started rotating him with Stewart or changed our shape to guarantee him starts? It’s easy to say “give him a coaching role”. But the club has a structure, we can’t just be creating roles to attract people. Where does that end?
Maybe he wants an 18 month deal at a high wage. Maybe he scores a few this season but we still don’t go up. Then next year we have a 40 year old striker in league one getting paid too much and struggling.
If he’s moving elsewhere for geographical reasons, should we have thrown money at him to come and play for us? Is that sending a good message to the market and agents that Sunderland are willing to do that? All of a sudden we become the place people come to for the money again. The piss take party comes back.
And should we be letting him live down south doing media duty and then paying for a helicopter to get him back? Again what message does that send about the region? “Come and play for Sunderland - it’s ok if you don’t want to live here!”
He’d have been brilliant. But the club has a plan. The club has standards. And the club has a structure and strategy that needs to be 100% focused on developing us back to where we want to be.
Bringing Defoe back in a way that fits that ethos would have been superb. Breaking it for short term gain would just be the first domino in a potentially damaging chain.
Now if we can convince him to join on our terms - I’ll be over the moon.