Ferguson Hands in Transfer Request

[Tris]

Ferguson refusing to play against Colchester changed the whole situation for Williams (and Hughes) ... it left them three days to try and get the maximum cash from Rangers.

Given the way Viola and Ferguson have handled this whole affair, one assumes that Rangers would have been made aware that Ferguson had pulled the ultimate stunt to force his return to Glasgow.

Once Ferguson went to that length to get his move, he devalued himself ... ... in more ways than one.

He did that the second he handed in a transfer request. The rest was just inevitable.

It's gone very quiet from those who wanted Ferguson to stay hasn't it?

I wanted him to stay, and I appear to be here! Although only you would try and turn such a sh!t end result into a point scoring exercise on the internet.

The reason I wanted him to stay is because, playing at their best, Savage and Ferguson would have been an awesome midfield pairing IMO.

I didn't like the fact that he'd asked for a transfer, but there's a world of difference between doing that and refusing to wear the shirt ... and it certainly wasn't "inevitable" that he'd go to those lengths to force Rovers' hand.

[Manchester Blue]

Nail hit firmly on the head for me. Hopefully we can look forward to the cup game and put this nonsense behind us. He's gone we've lost some money and a good player. We need to regroup and judging from Hughes' comments that won't be a problem. But then again am I naive to believe anything he says?

[Scotty]

I wanted him to stay, and I appear to be here! Although only you would try and turn such a sh!t end result into a point scoring exercise on the internet.

The reason I wanted him to stay is because, playing at their best, Savage and Ferguson would have been an awesome midfield pairing IMO.

I didn't like the fact that he'd asked for a transfer, but there's a world of difference between doing that and refusing to wear the shirt ... and it certainly wasn't "inevitable" that he'd go to those lengths to force Rovers' hand.

Can't be arsed with your cheap digs. Some people talked sense on this thread and some didn't.

[Manchester Blue]

Sense has nothing to do with it, you started the cheap digs so have no room to complain on that score.

[joey_big_nose]

I wanted him to stay, and I appear to be here!  Although only you would try and turn such a sh!t end result into a point scoring exercise on the internet.

The reason I wanted him to stay is because, playing at their best, Savage and Ferguson would have been an awesome midfield pairing IMO.

I didn't like the fact that he'd asked for a transfer, but there's a world of difference between doing that and refusing to wear the shirt ... and it certainly wasn't "inevitable" that he'd go to those lengths to force Rovers' hand.

Can't be arsed with your cheap digs. Some people talked sense on this thread and some didn't.

ladies!....

[Scotty]

Sense has nothing to do with it, you started the cheap digs so have no room to complain on that score.

Sense certainly had nothing to do with any of your posts on this thread.

[Eddie]

Oh give it a rest. Pointless crap. Stay on the topic and make football related comments that do make sense, rather than your subjective view of the world.

He's gone, some of us will have wanted him to stay, some of us will have wanted him to leave. I'm quite sure that most of us were excited by the prospect of the Savage/Ferguson midfield pairing, however, once Bazza became set on leaving the club did their best to get a good fee for him, and I think they did quite a good job. No good either having a go at each other or the club now, not going to help anyone out.

[Flopsy]

play nice boys

[key76]

I think it's about time this thread was locked. The poll now indicates how people have felt since the weak, namby-pamby, big-girls blouse left so lets leave the little niggles alone ladies move onto bigger and better things like who are we going to sign this summer????? I'm sure there's also another 120 pager due for next seasons away kit as well!!!!!!

[Flopsy]

ooo you cynic

[Eddie]

I'll start it off then...I hope it's purple

[Flopsy]

Keep it on topic

[Eddie]

God can you say anything else?

[RevidgeBlue]

I find Ferguson's refusal to play against Colchester astounding.

Can Ferguson refuse to play from a legal point of view ?

When he refused to play, was he not breaking the terms of his contract and why did not Rovers suspend him without pay, remind him of his responsibilities to his employers, send him home and tell him to return to the club only when he is ready to play again ?

IMO the club missed a golden opportunity to teach Ferguson and other selfish players like him a lesson.

The short answer to your first question jim is "no."

If it had been my own decision, in the absence of a suitable replacement I would have turned Ferguson's initial transfer request down flat and told him he could leave in the summer.

In the event the Board were a lot more accomodating to him than I personally would have been in acceding to his request and setting a fee.

When Rangers couldn't afford or wouldn't pay the original fee, Ferguson was outrageously taking the wotsit in allegedly refusing to play against Colchester.

He was clearly in breach of contract so personally I would have sent him home without pay until such time as he was prepared to make himself available for selection. A couple of weeks should have been enough to have Mrs. Ferguson chewing at her husband's ear.

As it is we are substantially weakened in midfield for the rest of the season. Yes we have the money, (£2m balance) but it's a huge gamble, this will seem extremely small beer if we are relegated.

And if anything I think today's revelations make us look even weaker than previously if that's possible. Barry Ferguson throws a hissy fit, spits his dummy out so we bend over backwards to rush through a last minute deal so he can have his own way.

A price quoted for a player is no longer THE price.

And Rangers having flogged us an overpriced player are laughing all the way to the Bank having bought him back on the cheap.

The thing is I think a very dangerous precedent has been set here. Now I can't see anything to stop this happening again. Anyone fancying a move only has to pull the same sort of stunt and if we try to resist they will be entitled to ask "If it worked for Barry, why not for me?"

[Shaddy]

IMO the club missed a golden opportunity to teach Ferguson and other selfish players like him a lesson.

Come off it Jim. It would have been cutting the nose of to spite the face. The transfer value of BF, over the subsequent six months we taught him a lesson/handled the disruption to the squad, would have fallen so sharply, he would have left next to nothing in the summer.

RevidgeBlue

The thing is I think a very dangerous precedent has been set here. Now I can't see anything to stop this happening again. Anyone fancying a move only has to pull the same sort of stunt and if we try to resist they will be entitled to ask "If it worked for Barry, why not for me?" sad.gif

I seriously don't understand this? What precedent? Player power! It happens all the time all over the place. This is no precedent.

What makes you think Rovers are/were immune to it? Duff pushed us all the way to resigning his contract. If the club hadn't worked extra hard in that area, Rovers would not have been in a position to turn down the first approx 15 million bid from Chelsea, nor receive the subsequent 18 (or whatever it actually was) million when the contract clause was met. And Dunn wasn't going to put his pen on paper to extend the two years left on his contract. If he'd stayed, with one year on his contract left, he would have been worth much less than the 5 million Rovers got.

[FourLaneBlue]

A price quoted for a player is no longer THE price.

Eh??? A price quoted for a player has never been THE price, merely the beginning of the haggling process and while it sometimes happens that the price is met on the majority of occasions there is a compromise between the two parties.

Human beings have been bartering for thousands of years so we can hardly lay the blame for that one at the door of John Williams.

Oh and the short answer to Jim's first question is "yes" he can refuse to play for us because he said he wasn 't mentally up to it. It's a crock of crap of course but a highly paid solicitor would be able to cite all the upheaval and speculation etc and make a good case for Ferguson being under a lot of stress and pressure.

Besides, what would we do if it was a breach of contract? Sack him? Just because a football club values a person as a commodity doesn't mean the law will do regarding personal matters. We can harldy get him to pay up the difference in valuation in what is essentially a human being. So he doesn't feel like playing; what we really going to do? We could sack him...but then we might as well go the whole hog and give him a lift up to Ibrox and hand him a specially wrapped leaving gift of our own nose which we just cut off to spite our face.

As for trying to force him to help us until the summer - the guy engineered his own move to Rangers (Viola did very well taking the flak when he was essentially just representing his client in the best way he could), whinged to the papers about our own business dealings of having the cheek to set our own price and followed it up by refusing to play against Colchester. As for the whole Christening malarky in Glasgow he was supposedly attending...well, make up your own mind about that. If anyone seriously think that after all that behaviour and those acts of petulant selfishness that he's just going to say "aye...welll nae bother" and roll up his sleeves (no doubt covered with bloody crocodile tears at missing out on Rangers) to playing his best for the club if we refused to sell him? All I can say is I could do with a pint of what they're having.

If we hadn't sold him then we'd have lost a hell of a lot in wages alone. Would anyone have stumped up more in the summer? Nah...seeing as (and it seems about the only thing he was truthful about) Barry wanted to go home. John Williams is certainly not above criticism but I fail to see what else he could have done that would not have financially damaged the club. Might as well have the money than have a player not doing his bit. The midflield would only have been weakened if we could trust in the performances of Ferguson and I don't trust him as far I can throw him anymore.

Thanks to Ferguson Rangers had us over a barrel, why anyone would want him any longer making a mockery of our club and own loyalty and passion is beyond me.

Barry refused to play

Edited February 2, 2005 by FourLaneBlue

[pg]

Agree with you Shaddy.

At the end of the day, the Ferguson incident is no different to a Sherwood, or a Le Saux who kicked up a stink mid-season and left.

The only player IMO who left with any honour was Berg. ManU - the biggest club in the universe, came for him mid season whilst we were in a relegation battle. And he turned them down.

At least Shearer left in between seasons.

I was hoping that Hughes could have at least convinced him to stay and 'do a Berg'. There is precedents for players to perform professionally for their clubs even if they are already set on moving elsewhere.

Its a shame that there aren't more Hennings in the world.

I suppose Mr Berg's only problem what that he isn't very clever when it comes to dealing with builders and housing contracts

Edited February 2, 2005 by pg

[philipl]

This whole thing has been an utter sickener.

Rovers have been punished for treating Ferguson decently and trying to retain his services.

Hughes must have put his authority on the line with the Board in advising them he could retain a motivated Ferguson at Ewood and must be livid and disillusioned by what has happened.

Rovers went to their "last and final" price of £6m in an effort to show Ferguson they were being reasonable then Ferguson pulled the stunt of refusing to play against Colchester.

Compared with the hell Savage went through at Brum, Rovers behaved decently over Ferguson and got rooked £1m for it.

Should have priced him at £8.5m as I suggested and thrown Rangers' £10m valuation of Boumsong back in their face when they moaned.

At least the 50/50 on the last day would have been a higher result and closer to the amount we paid for the disloyal weakling.

[streakyb]

I wanted him to stay, and I appear to be here! Although only you would try and turn such a sh!t end result into a point scoring exercise on the internet.

The reason I wanted him to stay is because, playing at their best, Savage and Ferguson would have been an awesome midfield pairing IMO.

I didn't like the fact that he'd asked for a transfer, but there's a world of difference between doing that and refusing to wear the shirt ... and it certainly wasn't "inevitable" that he'd go to those lengths to force Rovers' hand.

You want a player to stay who refused to wear the shirt by not wanting to play for Colchester.

Its irrelevant how good he is/was. He has to go because he didnt give a toss about our club and dint want to play for us and didnt care how we did.

This is born out be the fact the the club says he fused to play for us and the onlt thing he has said about us since he left is that rover v Bolton is not like Rangers v Celtic. Not a single word about the club, his teamates, playing in the premeisrhip. Just how moving was a big mistake and how he is so hapy to be bck at Rangers.

[Shaddy]

I didn't like the fact that he'd asked for a transfer, but there's a world of difference between doing that and refusing to wear the shirt ... and it certainly wasn't "inevitable" that he'd go to those lengths to force Rovers' hand.

You want a player to stay who refused to wear the shirt by not wanting to play for Colchester.

Mate, defended you on another thread, but here you've failed to read Tris's post. Tris said, that to him, it *is* a different matter when BF didn't want to put on the shirt for the Colchester match. See the portion I kept in the quote.

Edited February 2, 2005 by Shaddy

[streakyb]

Mate, defended you on another thread, but here you've failed to read Tris's post. Tris said, that to him, it *is* a different matter when BF didn't want to put on the shirt for the Colchester match. See the portion I kept in the quote.

Sorry, agree i misread post. Just figured he was still one of the 27% who still think we shouldnt have sold Fergurson.

I shall now state that those opionions of mine are not directed at tris, but anyone who feels we should still have Fergsuson.

[Tris]

Mate, defended you on another thread, but here you've failed to read Tris's post. Tris said, that to him, it *is* a different matter when BF didn't want to put on the shirt for the Colchester match. See the portion I kept in the quote.

Sorry, agree i misread post. Just figured he was still one of the 27% who still think we shouldnt have sold Fergurson.

I shall now state that those opionions of mine are not directed at tris, but anyone who feels we should still have Fergsuson.

I haven't actually voted at all!!

Because the poll was started before it emerged he'd refused to play against Colchester, so probably isn't a true reflection - I bet most of the 27% (if it still is 27%) have wanted to change their votes from the moment the LET came out yesterday.

[Wide-Bhoy]

IMO Ferguson has let Rovers down & embarrassed himself. Even though I'm a Celtic man I wanted him to do well & show everyone that he was a talent & for him to improve his game. I know he found it hard to be away from home but ffs what did he expect, the other thing being he was only a 2 & half hour drive from home. He can't have any pride I still rate him as a really good player but as a man he has plummeted in my eye's, I'm embarrassed for him.

[streakyb]

I bet most of the 27% (if it still is 27%) have wanted to change their votes from the moment the LET came out yesterday.

At 16:22 I made a note of the poll totals (see my post in the poll). This was after it had come out about Colchester and it was 50 v 113.

It is now 60 v 159.

So although some may have changed there minds it means that at least 10 people have voted after it had come out that he refused to play etc and that he made a mistake in joining us.

Just wonder why those 10+ still think we should have kept him????

[pg]

Because Andy Todd once refused to wear the shirt...