Monday Nov 25:
Mo’s interview has got everyone talking. I didn’t like it. Not one bit. I don’t want to make it seem bigger than it is though so let me say first of all that I don’t think it’s a big thing and I’m not losing any sleep over it. I’m not calling his names or slagging him off, I’m simply commenting on his decision to speak out yesterday and also what he said. It doesn’t change how I feel; I want him to stay and I think we should be doing all we can to keep him.
However, that does not extend to “give him whatever he wants” because we don’t know what he wants. It’s the easiest thing in the world to just automatically side with Mo over FSG because we’d all rather believe that it’s FSG “being mingebags again” rather than “Mo is being greedy”. That doesn’t make it fact though. In fact both things can be true. They’ve already given him a 350k a week contract as he approached his 30th birthday so let’s not completely lose sight of that. Is he happy with that or is he wanting more? Given who his agent is I’m fairly sure of the answer to that. If it was just about length of contract I’m sure it would have been sorted by now as it’s much easier to reach a compromise on that. The answer to every question in sports is usually “money” and this is no different.
A few months ago I’d have said the club are to blame for these contract hold ups. Virgil said they hadn’t spoken to him and I believe him. Trent has kept his own council the whole time so we don’t know what’s happening there. And Mo came out after the United game and, unprompted, to talk about how he thinks this is going to be his last season here. At that point I was willing to believe that they were dragging their heels and needed to get a fucking move on.
Not now though. We know talks have been taking place with all three as there’s absolutely no fucking way Edwards and Hughes have just sat around since the summer doing nothing to try and get these deals done. So when Mo comes out with that tripe he said yesterday, it makes me sceptical about him and how much stock I’m putting into what he says. I also don’t see the point of it. What is he trying to achieve? To get the fans onside? They already are. To put pressure on the club? Not gonna happen, they won’t give a fuck about this interview or how the fans react to it. It’s a business negotiation, they aren’t going to be swayed in the slightest by this, so why do it? I’m not seeing Virgil or Trent pulling this shit.
Mo says it’s December and no offer has been made. True but disingenuous. Why has an offer not been made? Because talks between the club and the agent haven’t gone well enough to get to that point. There’s obviously a disparity between what he wants and what the club is prepared to give, either in terms of salary, duration or possibly both. Contracts are only offered after common ground has been reached in talks. If Liverpool offered him a contract now he’d reject it because an agreement hasn’t been reached.
He also said “its not in my hands”. Errr no, it absolutely is. I’m sure he said the same last time too. He has a number that he’s asking for. So either the club agree and he stays, or they don’t and then he has to decide if he lowers his number to reach an agreement, or whether to leave and get that number elsewhere. He’s perfectly entitled to do either and I’m not telling him to just accept whatever is being offered because I don’t know what that is, and even if I did it’s not my decision to make and he has to do whatever he thinks is right for him. Either way though it is entirely in his hands, so please spare us the “I love the fans and the club and I just want to stay”. I don’t doubt any of that, but ultimately the thing holding this up is money. Just be honest and say “we’re far apart at the moment so its a stalemate”. Because clearly that’s the case.
Instead he’s saying it’s not in my hands and they haven’t offered me anything. Please. The only way it isn’t in his hands if if the club have said “we’re not going to offer you anything, thanks for your service, see you later”. And there’s no way that’s the case. I can well believe they’re trying to get him to accept considerably less than what he’s asking for. Of course they’re trying to lowball him at the moment. That’s how negotiations work. They’ll offer less than they’re willing to pay, he’ll ask for more than he’d be willing to accept and eventually they meet somewhere in the middle.
This is all part of the dance and we’ve been down this road before. The last time he wanted a new contract it was played out just like this too. Ordinarily he never talks to the press and that’s why I don’t like this. It won’t achieve anything, it’s completely unnecessary for him do it as now you have the fanbase up in arms and talking about this when we’re playing Real fucking Madrid tomorrow night. We shouldn’t even be thinking about this at the moment.
We are though, because Mo decided he wanted to put it out there. In seven years he’s stopped in the mixed zone to talk to them TWICE. It’s a running joke between the journalists that he won’t stop to talk but they’ll always ask him anyway just in case. This time he walked over to them because he clearly wanted to get all of this out in the open. That’s why I don’t like it.
If he was someone who regularly spoke to them after games and had that kind of a relationship, I’d be a lot more comfortable about him doing this. He’s not though, usually he leaves that kind of thing to his team-mates as he sees this as beneath him. He refuses to do the press conferences before CL games too by the way, even though he’s on the leadership committee. He doesn’t do them and leaves them to others. Then when there’s something in it for him he’s making a beeline to go over and talk.
Is it a big deal? No, it’s just white noise really. Does it change how I feel about him? No, because I’m not remotely surprised he did it as this is how he and his agent operate. It’s superstar behaviour and he is a superstar. This kind of goes with the territory, but it doesn’t mean I have to agree with it. I’d be willing to bet that after the game he got a text from his agent telling him to do it. It won’t have been pre-planned because if we’d lost the game there’s no way he does that. Coming off the back of scoring the two goals that won us the game though, Abbas defo wanted to strike while the iron was hot.
It’s pointless though, it hasn’t increased the chances of him getting what he wants and the only purpose it serves is to make the headlines today all about him. So now everyone in the media (and me too, in here, I guess) has to comment on it as its the main story, and if you say something people don’t like then look out because the abuse is coming. So needless and self indulgent. Ultimately though it’s nothing, because it absolutely won’t affect his performance level and I doubt his team-mates give too much of a shit about it either. Slot will have to face questions about it tomorrow but he’ll just brush it off so it’s nothing in terms of the impact it will have inside the building, but the outside noise is going to be deafening now.
In other news, there’s no Vinicius on Wednesday, which is good but a little disappointing too as it’s always good to see how your players stack up against the best. I said on the pod I’d go with Gomez for this one and keep Bradley for the weekend, but whoever plays is going to be up against Mbappe now rather than Vinicius. Bit of a frying pan / fire situation like, but it’s going to be a big game for whoever starts.
Meanwhile, Carvalho’s Dad replies to a Brentford post on Instagram saying (in Portuguese) “Son you have to leave this club”. He must have thought he was sending a DM, the soft cunt!
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