Just fully read the report on BBC about Pratley opting to move on: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/13701613.stm Is anyone else just a bit pissed off with the bullshit in it? Not just from him but it seems to becoming more of a regualr occurence when players leave clubs. In particular in Pratley's case the bit which mainly brings my blood to boil is where he states that he feels this is the time to leave for a new "challenge"...new challenge??? we just got promoted to the top division for the first time in 28 years and the only bloody welsh team to do it....now i may be missing something but surely trying to stay in the best league in the world and become a regular team there is more than enough of a bloody "challenge" for any player Pratley went on to say "It's not going to be easy for me, but if there was a good time to leave then it's now with the club having secured their place in the Premier League"...again if he is looking for a challenge then leaving now would be arguably one of the worse times to leave. Why cant he be honest and just say that we are not offering them enough money (whether thats a bad thing or good thing will become evident as the season goes). We all now that proabably the main reason he is going is that another team will offer him more money. I for one would respect that more and fully understand it given the potentially short career etc. I still wish him all the best and he has more than contributed to Swansea's rise over the last 5 years and i agree with posters on here that he may slow the game too much for Brendan's plans. I apologise if no one agrees with me on this but i have never posted a thread before and as i was typing the above to reply to a post and thought "this may just be worthy for its own thread and invoke a bit of debate" lol
sorrybut what i can gather he was never going to stay whatever we did, he was badly treated 8 months ago and wanted to leave then but because he was under contract was forced to stay, he has never forgiven the club for that and was determined to go whatever we would offer him, sadly its our loss as he is a great player that would have done really well for us in the premiership. good luck to him and i hope it dont come back to haunt us...
The facts don't say he was badly treated, he was the one who stopped discussions on the new contract, to solely criticise the club in this is not right, when quite clearly both sides were not agreeing to the terms of a new contract. http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/s/swansea_city/8798896.stm
I agree its all bullshut, the reason he is leaving is because Bolton or whoever his new club is does not have to pay a transfer fee, they will pay Darren a signing on fee and give him an enhanced package instead, its a win win situation for Darren and his new club. No sentiment involved, anything thats said is just PR nothing more nothing less. For me he has given us 5 years great service and now he's going and I wish him well in everything he does except when he plays us.
I refer you to the " Article " Why Should players be loyal " . 5 years of fantastic service , Pratley can go & do what he wants with my blessing , thank you & good luck toward the rest of his career ( cheers )
granted , he has given great service but is talking bull and obviously thinks we are fools. i would have more respect for him if he was honest and just admitted it's about playing premiership football for a lot more money
There are many reasons , I imagine , for Pratley's departure . More money , of course ... new challenges , yes .... being booed , that 2 even though he probably won't admit it . Jumble the reasons all together & he off & running . In the long run , his efforts over 5 seasons should be celebrated not belittled IMO . Just an opinion gents .
Let's get a time scale on all this, Shaun MacDonald and I think Orlandi, where given new contracts by Jenkins round about mid June 2010, Pratley's contract was coming to it's last year, and being on the starting sheet every week, you would think that Jenkins would have been keen to nail down one of our top performers, but Jenkins decided then to postpone contract talks, knowing that pratley wanted to sign a new contract, on top of this Sousa wanted to keep him, he also did not want a disgruntled player, so made representation to Jenkins on behave of Pratley, but that to fell on deaf ears, till it got to the point where pratley about December 2010 asked again for a new contract, to no avail, so we then have Pratley making a public statement: “I publicly made it clear last Christmas that I wished to extend my contract with Swansea as soon as possible. The former manager Paulo Sousa was aware of this and tried to get me a new deal, but nothing came forward from chairman Huw Jenkins." “I continued to ask for a new deal, but Mr Jenkins then said this summer that he was not in a rush to offer me one. I was disappointed with that stance and it made me reconsider my future." And who can blame him, I can't can you? Jenkins was quick to resign Shaun MacDonald, but not Pratley?? strange to say the least, and not the way to look after your top players who are always first on the team sheet, I don't doubt for one minute that money has not played a part in this, regardless of what Darren states, but there is no doubt in my mind that we need to sort out this hap hazard contract dealings, because it is costing us, to lose a player of Pratley's quality for nothing is poor business. and as I'm being constantly reminded on here by some Jacks that Football is a business, well let's be business like then, and not throw money away. Pratley was finally offered a contract when Rodgers arrived, and figured in his plans, but that was to late, as Pratley stated: “As soon as Brendan Rodgers took over he made it clear he saw me as a key player and the club finally made me an offer in writing last Thursday, two days before the start of the season. As I have said, Swansea offered me a great deal, but I felt it was too late. Now you can argue, that this is a load of cobblers from pratley, you can argue it was always about money, but one thing you can't argue with, is this, you don't put your top players at the back of the queue, or you don't put they're contract on hold, because if you do, then you run the risk of losing them, as we have here, Huw has played with fire on this one and been well and truly burnt. of course this all happened with the backdrop of Sousa-gate, there's nothing like politics to get in the way of progress, collateral damage maybe, who knows.
In fairness Phil , guys like MacDonald & Butler are small potatoes & easy contract signings , more often a burden than anything . But guys like Pratley are a different task . Nobody's breaking down the door for Butler & MacDonald , they are for Williams & Pratley . I read Pratley' s BBC football article & thought it was pure class , a lot more classier than Pratley being booed this season frankly . 10 non penalty goals this season under the conditions he was playing , combined with being the top scorer on the team last season has me thinking there is going to be a very lucky team this season in the Premier having Darren Pratley , and it ain't us .
Good point Breezy, I can't think of one good reason why you wouldn't want to discuss a deal with a player when he was, seemingly, wanting to actively do just that, well not one of your best player definitely, now Bolton will probably pick up a good box to box midfielder, for nothing! Thank goodness Bodde is back ................ please log in to view this image
Phil thing is most of what you said is speculation , you don't know what actually happened behind closed doors, and neither do I, but looking at the press releases suggest that the swans and him were discussing a new contract, nothing could be decided, Pratley said he didn't want to discuss anything in August, despite talks going on for months! Really a contract is a two way street, an offer is made it's declined, then it goes back and forth, a written contract is offered and he turns it down, I really think that yes probably mistakes had been made, but a contract had been made, it was a good one, to say it was to late is pure bullshit, if he wanted to stay he would have. Obviously a deal has been made elsewhere, and it probably has been there since the beginning of the year, it's Wigan or now maybe Villa if Martinez goes there. I am not having a go at him, but Phil you don't all the ins and outs of this, and to put everything on the club and Jenkins on speculation is not right!
Also remember all the hype at the beginning of last season of Pratley on his way to Forest, add that in and its more likely he tried to use that to force a better deal and it didnt come off which is why he didnt sign as he wanted more ££££
I think its a bit harsh to say he was mistreated in the contract negotiations. We probably offered him one of the best contracts the board have offered any player and given his ability and passion that he played with was deserved...but Premiership teams were sniffing around and he probably wanted MORE. And we werent willing to give him more unless we made the Premiership where we would have the extra money, so there would be no point in continuing negotiations. hence they were halted and restarted post promotion. Everyone knew then he was after more money, hence the treatment by the fans (which i dont agree with and thougt was shocking) so why didnt he just come out and say so! He knows it, The board know it, management know it the fans know it so why come up with all this bollox of 'wanting a challenge'
As a few posters have pointed out we will never know the full facts because the club will want us to believe one scenario and Darren will want us to believe another. I personally think that Darren (via his agent) have tried to negotiate hard for a top package and the club didnât give them what they wanted. Anything else thatâs said is bollicks and PR stuff IMO, being booed (which was well out of order BTW) is not going to influence a players decision to stay or leave a club and Darrenâs statement that the last contract he was offered was a great deal but by then it was too late, again bollicks if that last contract was good enough and he really wanted to stay he would have signed it. I have no ill feeling towards him whatsoever, all the statement and counterstatement by him and the club is just about saving face and not wanting to be seen to be the villain. At the end of the day I think the club handled this poorly and Darren wanted too much money, all in all a recipe for disaster for the club because he walks on a free. Lesson must be learned......
It can be a new challenge playing for a different team. The challenge doesn't have to be a higher league. He also may see Bolton as a bigger and better club, so hence a bigger challenge. Nothing at all wrong with what he said. Maybe he just wants to see if he can make an impact with another team. You are getting upset over nothing. Calm down and forget about it.
Hey Bangkok you may be right who knows, but I doubt it. I think its all about the money and like I've said many times before I dont blame Darren at all for trying to earn the most he can (I would too) and I wish him luck and I dont think its the end of the world for us. The big dissapointment is that we are losing a couple of Mill player for nothing and it MAY have been avoidable and thats just bad for business.
I think here lies the truth, we definitely need to sort out this inept contract policy of ours, it's throwing money away and not good business! Scotty listen now, there's only one person in charge of the contract talks, unless you know different! No need for the dig, and jager my previous comment comes from information supplied by Huw Jenkins, and Pratley, that is in the public domain, it's far from speculation as you put it, matter of fact I would say you have not got your facts correct!..................... please log in to view this image
