You mean like Aaron Ramsey who went to Juventus for a £8m signing on fee and £400K a week?
Find me something that says he got the 8M signing fee plus the 400k a week and I’ll believe that. I think the way these figures are reported is that the sign on fee is rolled into something that is paid over time. By the same token I’d struggle to believe Arsenal gave Ozil 300k a week as his basic weekly wage - I’m pretty sure they juiced it with a sign on fee.
But my point is this - and if that ESPN article is to be believed, it’s something the Spurs camp feel too. We are not the only club that has a ‘wage structure’. Other clubs may have a larger budget than ours, but every club will pay their most important players the most, their squad players less, etc etc. Because every club needs to have some semblance of parity and order.
These clubs, be it Barca, Real, or Juve, clearly don’t view Eriksen as important enough to force our hand for given that he’d be available for a reasonable price this summer. Real went hard for Hazard because they wanted him. Barca don’t really have space. Juve are the only ones that really have recent track in bargain hunting for free agents and who’s to say what space they have next summer. Maybe they ship someone out and offer Eriksen the world to join. Maybe they don’t. I’ll bet they view Ramsey as a particularly important player. It will be interesting to see if Eriksen can get a move where he is viewed as important as he is at Spurs.
Because if clubs take a punt on him, they need space in the squad, and they need to have a plan for how they’ll use him. If Real view him as a Modric replacement, he’ll be paid big money. If they view him as a worthy squad player that they take a punt on, they will offer him less. Unless they are desperate for him, they aren’t offering him the world.
There’s the very real possibility that even if he leaves, he isn’t going to be a first choice. Clubs also have to weigh up whether they want to give him a seat in their squad or sign someone younger who may be more suited. Eriksen doesn’t strike me as a Real attacker. Barca got Frenkie. Juve have loads of players in his position.
I think Eriksen is playing a dangerous game because there is also the possibility that he burns his bridges with us and is forced to go somewhere else that isn’t Barca or Real and isn’t even us. Not that there will be bad feeling, just that if he continues to fumble about his plans we are going to have to move on and make plans without him. If we managed to get Dybala, it would have already put him in a really tricky spot for this season. He’s got a reprieve, so it will be interesting to see what happens.
To all the people that think he’s just going to walk in to one of the biggest teams in the world and get paid big money, it was assumed Toby would be gone the last two summers, because obviously he is class and obviously some club will take advantage of his contract situation. But it didn’t happen. Clubs have to value him enough over signing someone else. There is an opportunity cost to signing anyone that needs to be considered. Maybe both Toby and Eriksen walk into super clubs and get paid the earth, but I suspect we would have heard more noise from those clubs already by now if they were going to have that happen. If you ask me, I don’t think it’s a given they get the money they think they think they deserve. In Eriksen’s case I think it’s a playing style thing, and in both cases I think it’s a mentality thing. Neither strike me as the kind of ruthless winners the top clubs seek from a personality perspective. They aren’t obsessed like Kane, or have the big game roosteriness of a Dele. I think they are good, team orientated guys that Poch’s environment helps bring them up a level, but I don’t think they have the arrogance of a Hazard. And that’s probably why, despite being inconsistent over a number of seasons, Chelsea still manage to pick up some trophies. They have some bastards that are obsessed with winning.
