Owen and Martins contract clauses

[Guest Brazilianbob]

I know there is a lot of unrest, but there was nothing wrong with Shepherd allowing these clauses to be put into players contracts.  All players/agents demand them.

 

In the case of Owen and Martins, they wanted these clauses in because, like the fans, they quite rightly want to be playing in Europe.#

 

However, in my opinion, the problem is that Shepherd did not foresee that his managerial appointments would fail to provide European football, and I would point out that the clauses could not be activated if we had managed to qualify for Europe albeit the Intertoto Cup, and it was unbelievably arrogant of Shepherd to believe NUFC would not at least qualify for the Intertoto Cup, given the quality of managers he appointed!

[BlufPurdi]

I think the position we were in, and with the managers we had when we signed them, they were probably necessary. I had no problem with them, it was just the mass denial by fans and the club that they ever existed that did my box in.

[Crumpy Gunt]

I know there is a lot of unrest, but there was nothing wrong with Shepherd allowing these clauses to be put into players contracts.  All players/agents demand them.

 

In the case of Owen and Martins, they wanted these clauses in because, like the fans, they quite rightly want to be playing in Europe.#

 

However, in my opinion, the problem is that Shepherd did not foresee that his managerial appointments would fail to provide European football, and I would point out that the clauses could not be activated if we had managed to qualify for Europe albeit the Intertoto Cup, and it was unbelievably arrogant of Shepherd to believe NUFC would not at least qualify for the Intertoto Cup, given the quality of managers he appointed!

 

If he couldn't see it he was the only cunt who couldn't.

[James]

I bet Luque also has a £12m clause.

[Keefaz]

I bet Luque also has a £12m clause.

 

Not much chance of that being activated.

[thomas]

I think the position we were in, and with the managers we had when we signed them, they were probably necessary. 

This is what I felt and said as much in the "Shepherd to lose his job over clauses" thread.  No doubt it went something like "Sure I'll sign for your shit team and shit manager but I want an easy out of bad turns to worse." And, well, with Souness and then Roeder at the helm there was no stopping that progression.

[Guest thaitoon]

so most players have them, beg to differ old chap, cant see ferguson, wenger, benietez etc agreeing to any of their players having walkout clause, well recognised that we at the time HAD to agree to these clauses otherwise they wouldnt have signed, talk about the tail wagging the dog.

panic buys , buy a panicking chairman to get himself out of a real dodgy position, talk about see through tactics, only fred didnt realise this.wonder how long ashley has really been eyeing up this club of ours, errr his now, must have had his people on it for a while i would assume , along with other potentials i guess.

suppose we"ll never know though.

[Guest optimistic nit]

my problem isn't that they have clauses, but of the value. there is no way a 9mill clause in owens contract is a good idea, we should just have not signed him, if he demanded a clause so small. Martins clause is also way too small. 13mill for a 21 year old bought for 10million is just too low, and while i can see that maybe owens clause was inevitable, i refuse to believe that without negotiation martins' clause could have been increased to over 15million at least.

[Keefaz]

I suspect many players do, but we're talking about large sums in order to trigger these release clauses, not the paltry prices we've been forced into agreeing to.

[James]

Didn't Roeder say Oba was now worth £20m?

 

Obviously he didn't have a clue about what was going on

[Dokko]

I bet Luque also has a £12m clause.

 

[jep]

so most players have them, beg to differ old chap, cant see ferguson, wenger, benietez etc agreeing to any of their players having walkout clause, well recognised that we at the time HAD to agree to these clauses otherwise they wouldnt have signed, talk about the tail wagging the dog.

panic buys , buy a panicking chairman to get himself out of a real dodgy position, talk about see through tactics, only fred didnt realise this.wonder how long ashley has really been eyeing up this club of ours, errr his now, must have had his people on it for a while i would assume , along with other potentials i guess.

suppose we"ll never know though.

 

 

That's the point though. Clubs of their stature will never have to resort to these sort of clauses to bring players in. At the moment, we do - if only to attract players to take us to the level where we need to, and should, be. For mid-table clubs it's a necessity, simple as.

[Nobody]

my problem isn't that they have clauses, but of the value. there is no way a 9mill clause in owens contract is a good idea, we should just have not signed him, if he demanded a clause so small. Martins clause is also way too small. 13mill for a 21 year old bought for 10million is just too low, and while i can see that maybe owens clause was inevitable, i refuse to believe that without negotiation martins' clause could have been increased to over 15million at least.

Agree. What if Owen had stayed injury-free and banged in goals for us and then walked away for £9m. Would've been insane! What makes the £9m price-tag on him now understandable is that he hasn't played for almost two years, but of course, this wasn't something Freddy was expecting when the clause was put there.

[Guest samtoonarmy]

I don't know why you put these clauses in the contracts of people like Owen and Martins. What kind of idiot would put just a £9m get out claus for Owen?

[spizz energi]

Any truth in the rumour Viduka has a 12 pie clause?

[Keefaz]

I don't know why you put these clauses in the contracts of people like Owen and Martins. What kind of idiot would put just a £9m get out claus for Owen?

 

The kind of idiot who knows it's the only way he's going to get Owen to sign.

[Guest emre123]

Why does Henry have a £85 million release clause in his Barca contract?? What's the point in that? Especially being 29 going on 30.

[Guest samtoonarmy]

I don't know why you put these clauses in the contracts of people like Owen and Martins. What kind of idiot would put just a £9m get out claus for Owen?

 

The kind of idiot who knows it's the only way he's going to get Owen to sign.

 

True. But why for £9m when we signed him for £17m.

[Mowen]

Why does Henry have a £85 million release clause in his Barca contract?? What's the point in that? Especially being 29 going on 30.

 

I'm pretty sure that Spanish law means that all Spanish players have to have them, so they just set them ridiculously high most of the time. Messi's is well in excess of £100m I think.

[SAK]

Is martins clause confirmed though? I recall Allardyce saying Owen had one but nothing mentioned about MArtins.

[Exiled in Texas]

Wasn't the general feel that we overpaid for Oba when we paid £10M for him.  If the thought that he wasn't worth $10M, but we were desperate to sign him so overpaid, then a release clause of a 30% profit (and likely £4-5M above market value) doesn't seem so bad.  If no team was interested in him at £10M, then what chance £13M.  Fact is, he played well, scored goals and his value has increased.

[Guest Brazilianbob]

so most players have them, beg to differ old chap, cant see ferguson, wenger, benietez etc agreeing to any of their players having walkout clause, well recognised that we at the time HAD to agree to these clauses otherwise they wouldnt have signed, talk about the tail wagging the dog.

panic buys , buy a panicking chairman to get himself out of a real dodgy position, talk about see through tactics, only fred didnt realise this.wonder how long ashley has really been eyeing up this club of ours, errr his now, must have had his people on it for a while i would assume , along with other potentials i guess.

suppose we"ll never know though.

 

They will have them but they can only be activated if their clubs fail to qualify for europe!  Hence we never hear of them because Arsenal et al always qualify for europe

[LoveItIfWeBeatU]

Is martins clause confirmed though? I recall Allardyce saying Owen had one but nothing mentioned about MArtins.

Confirmed by Allardyce today on NUFC.co.uk

[Guest Brazilianbob]

I don't know why you put these clauses in the contracts of people like Owen and Martins. What kind of idiot would put just a £9m get out claus for Owen?

 

The kind of idiot who knows it's the only way he's going to get Owen to sign.

 

True. But why for £9m when we signed him for £17m.

 

Its called amortisation, the club devalues a players value each season so the club only makes a small loss on their profit and loss accounts each season, rather then having to show a loss of £17m at the end of a four year contract.  In Owen's case, it looks like his value is decreasing by about £4m a year, hence the valuation of £9m!

[ohmelads]

I doubt most players do have these types of contracts - how often do you see them triggered? I'm sure a lot of the top players have clauses in case they're relegated, but that's never going to happen at their clubs and the clauses will be for very large amounts of money.

 

A club struggling in the bottom half doesn't go out and buy a player for £16m while agreeing to sell him for half that if they don't make Europe. That's just nuts.

 

We didn't have to buy Owen or Martins. The reason nobody (me included) believed the Owen clause existed was because it would have been total madness, too stupid even for Shepherd. The fat controller must take full responsibility and these clauses are totally indefensible.