28 Nov 2018 08:34:29
This Rice situation with his contract, there surely must be something going on behind the scenes which is more then just not given him a contract for what he is worth.

If you take a different angle rather than football, Sullivan is a shrew somewhat ruthless business man, he has an asset which in a few years could be worth in excess of £30m if not more. Even if he gave him now a 5 year contract with £50k a week and say topped up with bonuses maybe £70k, £70k x 52 = £3.6m x 5 years = £18m.

By nailing down on such an attractive contract now he would sign, this would protect his transfer fee for at least 3 years, even after three years and he carries on progressing and decided he wants CL football we sell him on, we would have laid out £10.8m in salary. But he transfer as mentioned above would be excess of the £30m hence roughly a £20m profit. by p***ing him about on his contract and the relativity low wages he is asking for he could just turn round and say his had enough if his not valued at WH on the salary he wants he can go on a free end of next season.

I just don't get this at all, even if the board don't think his worth what his asking for in salary you have to tie him down to protect a transfer fee. hence me thinking something else must be happening with this not just money? . does that make sense? or am I still recovering from a night out!

1.) 28 Nov 2018
28 Nov 2018 12:46:32
Hi Warrington, I'm confused as well, they say the spine of the team is important, well, Rice is part of the spine of our team so I don't really know what their waiting for, maybe they want to see who they can move on in January to free up some wages, we just can't let a player like this go, there would be a riot if that happened.

2.) 29 Nov 2018
29 Nov 2018 12:48:01
Definitely something up with this, as we all want him signed and I am sure the board do also. I am no insider and don't pretend to know what's ACTUALLY going on, but my feelings are its a combo of:
1. We are at the max end of our salary cap so it may have to wait until January when some excess can be off-loaded.
2. New proposed wage structure. I am a big fan of this in principle, as it is disgusting watching players come to clubs on high wages and then do nothing. (Adebeyor rings a bell, he had offers from all over but never left City until he could get a singing on fee or part paid salary from City, he would rather sit in stands and earn cash) However, this policy in realty is not going to be easy to implement. FFP needs to regulate this more IMHO, maybe a total club salary cap, with freedom to offer big bonuses for specified certain criteria/ milestones.
3. Rice may be waiting to hit a certain amount of appearances so that he can get a higher basic from the start.
4. His new agent is managing this, who is known for being a hard negotiator.
5. We have offered to little. Despite still being VERY early in his career he is worth £35k a week min, which should be increased on appearance milestones that get him to £50k by the end of next season. Not including game bonuses.