From an outsiders point of view your right, but from our point of view, his goals kept us up which in itself will bring in over £70m to the club. If he does the same again and bags 10+ goals to help keep us up a second season... then he most definitely is worth whatever we are paying him.
As mentioned it was January prices, he was on 40k at WBA and they wouldn't increase his wage while we would.
Last night Richards tweeted Huddlestone, Davies, Aluko and Livermore to say what a great show they had put on yesterday and hard luck. Thought this was strange why he did this, and wondered if there was already something on going.
Would love any of those here but think Swansea will take Sinclair , Everton will take rodwell and think a few clubs would want Richards possibly one of the bigger boys
I think Richards will be looking for a team to get regular football, not sit on the bench at one of the big boys, as he has done enough of that at Man City.
Richards would be an unbelievable signing, as would Rodwell. Pair those with a very decent left back and a creative central midfielder and we have the makings of a truly great side. Then it's just looking for bits and bobs for cover in one or two areas. Edit: actually, scratch the creative midfielder (unless Livermore doesn't sign) as Huddlestone will have far more freedom to swan about up the pitch with Rodwell holding fort. Swap for a handy right winger and that would be some team.
I'm not so sure he wouldn't get game time if he signed for arsenal who are likely to need a rb man utd or liverpool
I liked Richards when he first came on the scene, however from what I heard he was lazy & troublesome, a bit similar to Sturridge when he wanted silly money & was still unproven. Still it's not to say that he's now matured into a footballer & has lost his big head mentality. Rodwell, I don't see him going back to Everton. Never know though as Everton need the same as us with Europe & all that. He'd definitely be good for us though!
Shane Long won't be on anything like 50k, I think our highest paid player is Jelavic and he's somewhere around the 35-40k mark I believe (that's from a source within the club, in finance). I don't know the ins and outs of all the player contracts, but I can tell you that a lot of the players had promotion wage rises in their contracts and there are certainly some players on more than they should be, given their appearances and squad role.
Well Aluko was offered a new deal this year, which is pretty lucrative by the standards he's played this year, however he's a first team player with a fantastic level of ability. I was referring to the likes of Bruce, Jakupovic, Quinn (although he did well on Saturday) and Koren.
Morgan, could be a decent player and an apt replacement for Koren. We need a decent squad if we are to balance Europe and the league.
We will need a better standard of player to compete in Europe. We finished in 16th place because the players we had tailed off towards the end, ran out of steam. Next season we will be in Europe, which potentially adds more games against higher quality teams and players. We need better than somebody from a team that finished below us in the league. We can and probably will get better.
