Claudius wrote:
we should have a squad where good players can feel they will go from 50 to 100 to 150k if they continue to perform. If there is evidence that good players are rewarded, good players will generally stay. The bad players don't have much negotiating leverage.
Good point. It also helps to show even those with sympathetic tendencies to a togetherness/egalitarian/whateverthefuckhesthinking approach, what is really wrong with that from the bad players perspective.
Suppose you want to have a narrow, equal structure - say Jenko's get around 30, lower regulars around 50, higher reg's 70-80, and superstars 100+ (plus for when we get Messi). That's nice, perhaps, if you really get what you signed them for. But what dod you do when you signed Squilacci for over 50, or had a good year from Almunia and was tempted to make a huge mistake? What with even better players, like Rosicky and Diaby?
Sign lower deals - that "egalitarian" base is fine. Then renegotiate after a year or two - see about consistency, about health, progress. Don't get stuck with Squilacci, or others that choke the entire structure and give nothing. This can still sit well with "equal basis", but is not as utterly blind (and stupid).
Though I must say that the whole idea of players expecting to get the same is a bit funny. people tend to look at others close to them, but do it more on the lower scales. When they've already made it to top level football, they dare well aware of what it takes, and normally feel very lucky to be where they are. they don't expect to be rewarded beyond their real talent - in fact I think it could create unhealthy feelings.
Exactly the opposite of what those who do know they are worth more, and not receive it, may develop. And that resentment would normally be directed exactly at those who hold them back: they carry them with their talent, and they don't get rewarded fairly because they also need to carry their cost?
Idealists are many times oblivious to just how flawed their detached stance is - blinded by the "beauty" of it, no doubt.
EDIT: yeah, I agree with your later post as well:
Our ability to win is dependent on having 3 or 4 good players that everyone feels privileged to play next to. Not having 100 Chamakhs.
General Mirth wrote:
We offered van Persie that much, didn't we? Made no difference.
We can't fix everything with the improved structure. VP was one of the best in the world, and the top teams would want him. There's no guarantee we'll be able to keep a player like that in the future. But we stand a far better chance to, if we'll pay them properly and fairly from the start, and we have a better chance to win something like that, which is very likely to give them further motivation to stay.
I personally don't believe it was even true about VP that money actually was his main concern. If we were likely to win something, he'd have stayed for much, much less than what he could get at city, or even Utd.
