WWOCB - I admire your ethos but this is not Utopia. "........its a sense of sportsmanship" - when has that ever been an issue in football.
But at what point should we actually question if he is going to recover ... or at least is he going to be the same player if he does Seems like a bit risk to me
18 months out injured without even so much as a brief cameo appearance tells me he's finished. He is/was a decent player but even if he were Lionel Messi I'd still be saying the same. It's no good having Pele, Maradonna and Messi on the books if they're spending a year and a half at a time on the treatment table!!
Although Youga's been out for the last 18 months if he fully recovers from the injury and feels ready to play again i'd offer him a deal as well albeit on reduced terms. Yes he has cost us a lot of money paying him while he's been out but we can't change that so if he is fully recovered and can accept reduced terms or a pay-as-you-play i'd say go ahead and do it as on his day he is the best LB in this division
There's a lot of iffs there Martin... Even if he suddenly declared himself fit (which wouldn't surprise me given his contract has just expired) i would have to think long and hard before offering him even a pay as you play deal. Make no mistake, any injury that keeps someone out of the game for eighteen months is a bad one alright. Nothing would make me happier than for him to declare himself fit tomorrow and be an ever present in our side this coming campaign, but i just can't see it I'm afraid!
Well considering my opinion on how we should deal with his contract has no influence on how we will in reality, I'm free to be as utopian as I like Tbh, if anyone was to say, for example, we're going to sign Mackail-Smith/Austin/Lambert (insert any name here) in a seasons time, we just have to pay a bit of money upfront, would most of you say hell yes? If so, its somewhat similar to the Youga situation. We know he won't be playing for us for a while, but we have his name on our books and know that when he does play, he should (hopefully) take the League by storm. I don't think I can bear to see another (imo) quality Charlton player leave, and then be successful elsewhere.
"I don't think I can bear to see another (imo) quality Charlton player leave, and then be successful elsewhere." Brace yourself, WeWant because I don't see us changing a philosophy that's been part of the club's modus operandi for so many years. I was reading yesterday that after their relegation, Bristle Rovers have released 17 players - the only player they're in negotiations with to sign a new deal is, wait for it, Harry Pell. Only saw Pell play twice and could scarcely believe it when we let him go, similarly Josh Wright and Harry Arter - OK, none of the three are ever going to be world-beaters, but the fact they never really got a chance to show whether they could put in a solid shift for us is still pretty worrying. What is it that other clubs pick up on that we can't seem to see?
I'd rather have Josh Wright back out of the three, at times he was more exciting than Jonjo and I was really surprised as well as gutted when he left. Think he also handed in a transfer request at Scunthorpe recently?
Sorry the last point about the transfer request was just out of interest, not a suggestion that we try sign him up because I know he wouldn't come back to us and play in this league.
