[Archived] Liverpool V Rovers

[USABlue]

Thank you so much for moving the MoM poll, a few of us asked for that early on, it actually stopped me from bothering to read the post match comments. Shame it took so long to do it but thanks anyway

[den]

Thank you so much for moving the MoM poll, a few of us asked for that early on, it actually stopped me from bothering to read the post match comments. Shame it took so long to do it but thanks anyway

Happy to oblige. We will keep it that way until the end of the season and see how it goes. As for next season, we don't know yet, whether to persist with the MOTM polls at all. It's all down to you guys really.

[American]

Thank you so much for moving the MoM poll, a few of us asked for that early on, it actually stopped me from bothering to read the post match comments. Shame it took so long to do it but thanks anyway

You've really adapted to the "work ethic" of your new country! Don't want to hit page down one or 2 more times?

[S15]

WHat are you suggesting? That we don't reward them when they play well? In all likelihood if we don't increase their wages they will look to move. And off the back of six months form loads of clubs would want to buy them - Pedersen, Nelsen, Reid, McCarthy, Savage all aroused serious interest. And then no doubt you would be pulling your eyes out because we couldn'tr hold on to those - who in that moment until the fans decide they are suddenly awful - are seen as our best players.

What you are essentially asking the board to do is look into the future and predict that the players will become rubbish. Which, to me, sounds like a profoundly difficult thing to do.

Also in you analysis you are unfair. Nelsen was excellent for us for 18 months, Samba for nearly a year, Savage a year and a half, McCarthy a year.

You are asking for the impossible. We can't buy players worth serious money because we don't have the cash, and now you are asking us to risk losing those that we do have because we think they might become rubbish at some point in the future?

There is a very strong liklihood David Bentley could have a season next year that is nowhere near as good as this years. Look at the up and down form of Joe Cole, Damien Duff, Aaron Lennon, Michael Owen, I could go on. Should we not offer him a contract on that basis?

We shouldn't be offering new deals to people who have only recently signed a deal. Regardless of them being a newish arrival or not. The chances are Bentley wont be here by the end of his current contract which expires in 3 years. You can negotiate maximum fee as long as a player has 2 or more years left on his current contract. On this basis, is it really worth us paying Bentley more money over one extra year when the chances are he'll be off next summer at the latest?

The same applies to the others, they all had/have plenty of time left on their current deals, and if they keep performing to their maximum bigger clubs will come in regardless of them having 2 years or 4 years left on a contract.

And, like I say, it is a little coincidental that alot of these players let their level drop once they sign for the 'long haul.'

[Fife Rover]

We shouldn't be offering new deals to people who have only recently signed a deal. Regardless of them being a newish arrival or not. The chances are Bentley wont be here by the end of his current contract which expires in 3 years. You can negotiate maximum fee as long as a player has 2 or more years left on his current contract. On this basis, is it really worth us paying Bentley more money over one extra year when the chances are he'll be off next summer at the latest?

The same applies to the others, they all had/have plenty of time left on their current deals, and if they keep performing to their maximum bigger clubs will come in regardless of them having 2 years or 4 years left on a contract.

And, like I say, it is a little coincidental that alot of these players let their level drop once they sign for the 'long haul.'

I think it's called "entering the comfort zone". Not a good idea to let them think that!

[joey_big_nose]

We shouldn't be offering new deals to people who have only recently signed a deal. Regardless of them being a newish arrival or not. The chances are Bentley wont be here by the end of his current contract which expires in 3 years. You can negotiate maximum fee as long as a player has 2 or more years left on his current contract. On this basis, is it really worth us paying Bentley more money over one extra year when the chances are he'll be off next summer at the latest?

The same applies to the others, they all had/have plenty of time left on their current deals, and if they keep performing to their maximum bigger clubs will come in regardless of them having 2 years or 4 years left on a contract.

And, like I say, it is a little coincidental that alot of these players let their level drop once they sign for the 'long haul.'

Problem is though if you don't provide the deals then you undermine morale and the players will immediately have one eye on the exit door.

Hughes is trying to hold onto his players, that is his first concern. Not keeping in line with premiership pay is exactly how to make us into a perennial stepping stone club. It wouldn't be the case of just the cream of the crop (Duff, Bentley, Bellamy) moving to Champions League teams but rather what you are advocating would see the likes of Reid, Warnock, Emerton, MGP, Dunn, RSC, McCarthy, Roberts, Nelsen, Samba move to the likes of Villa, Portsmouth or Middlesborough for the money on offer. All of those players are easily good enouth for those sort of clubs to be interested in adding them to their squads.

We would be on a one way train to relegation. You have to keep the players happy. That is why every premiership club pays the daft wages.

If we try and game the players by not rewarding them then all we are achieving is moving them closer to the door. We can't offer them less money than they will get elsewhere that is lunacy. You would feel insulted if you knew an employer down the road would offer 50% more for your services, but your current employer refused to match that.