Maybe. If you nip it in the bud early you might minimise this risk. you could even do what they did with Jags, and ask for a short term commitment, renegotiating the deal they have to allow them to go if we don't go up. Or, I don't know, perhaps you could only sell one of them, which was the screamingly obvious move, halving your potential problem.
Do you know that we didn't do this?
Once the players have their heads turned and see the sorts of money they will be making, just how are we supposed to convince them it's a good idea to not only stay on, but to sign a new deal?
As Lescott shows, a contract does not force them to stay in the correct frame of mind, let alone performance level for them to continue to be a useful assett. Should Everton have forced him to play so far? What effect does the situation have on the rest of the squad?
Completely different situation. Lescott plays for England. Walker had played 5 first team games. Man city pay a hell of a lot more than Spurs, and Lescott will walk into the team. Meanwhile, Naughton sits on his arse on th bench.
It's all relative. Both Kyles have played for the England set up and some are absolutely convinced that they will go on to play for the first team.
Man City may pay more than Spurs, but by the same measure Everton pay Lescott far more than Sheffield United can pay the Kyles.
Regardless of Man City's position, isn't your theory that Everton could just hold him to his contract?
Clubs may not deal with certain agents: the reverse is not true. Agents will always deal with clubs even if there's bad blood. Nature of the business. Anyway, what is there to lose? the way McCabe tells it, we are helpless in the face of agents anyway.
Regardless of them dealing with us if there is bad blood, don't you think that it simply reduces our power to clinch a deal? especially on respectable terms. There is also the problem that, if i've been told correctly, Kyle's agent is also employed by more of our players.
Perhaps one of the reasons it works is that Wednesday have got into the habit of telling the media players are not for sale, which we patently did not do. Tudgay was different - Wednesday let him talk to Burnley, but did not get the offer they were looking for so he stayed. they did not cast around like crazy trying to sell to someone else.
We did previously tell the press that Kyle Naughton wasn't for sale. Simply saying something in the press doesn't magically stop big clubs coming in and trying to take your players though. How did we cast around like crazy? The two clubs came in for the players, we didn't start an auction, we didn't snap their hands off for the first deal.
I'm sure Burnley were offering more than Wednesday were paying, and it's naive to argue otherwise. Stoke are a similar team to Burnley yet they had no difficulty signing our best player...
I'm sure they were, but my point is, there is a far bigger gulf between United and Spurs than Burnley and Wednesday. Stoke had no difficulty purely for the fact that they were willing to gamble big money on wages for a player who's agent was manufacturing a move/renewal for. There is absolutely no way in this world McCabe should have sanctioned what Beattie's agent wanted, so we'd be back to the same "holding players to their contract" situation.
We were not powerless, as I have shown above. they viewed it as good business and they did it, because they looked at it solely in cash terms and not in footballing terms. This powerlessness schtick is IMHO after the event windowdressing.
Football terms didn't come into it into the slightest. Not because they weren't considered, but because they were simply irrelevant to the situation once it was clear we were in no position to be able to hold onto the players.
If you truley believe that we could have just held them to their contracts and then got them to sign a further deal with clauses, then i'm afraid we'll just have to agree to disagree.
