That's the thing. People are making more of this because of how much the guy is making from us as if he held us over a barrel and forced us to give him his deal. Yes he's rich, yes footballers are obscenely overpaid, and yes there are many, many, many professions more worthy of being paid more than footballers, but the unfairness of a capitalistic society isn't what's being discussed.
Burnwinter wrote:
Cross my heart, if my highest paid colleague or collaborator was drawing their wages while doing nothing and tweeting public relations exercises, bleeding the budget out of every one of our shared projects, I'd detest them just as much. It runs against pride, justice and grace.
The situation is not the same BW. You are assuming that the person in your workplace chose to do nothing, did not come into the office everyday, and did not do whatever task that was given to him for the day/week. Ozil still trains and is available for selection, he's just no longer good enough to play for us. He hasn't refused to train nor has he refused to play for the team.
I've had people in my workplace (some senior staff, others mid career) for one reason or another get completely sidelined by new/existing management just because they wanted them to be moved on. Some were wanted out for strategic changes, others political reasons. The only way they could fire the staff is to wait for his contract to run out and not renew or to fire him based on disciplinary reasons, so they'd resort to tactics to force them to choose to want out.
These guys would be reassigned to the roles of advisor to the CEO or MD or other vague sounding positions but only for the purpose of making sure they have no real work or influence over the day to day operations. Some of the younger guys who this had happened to found other positions with lower salaries and left as they had their whole careers ahead of them but a couple (especially the older ones) decided to just stay, come into the office every day, do whatever busywork they were asigned and pick up their paychecks. I really wouldn't be angry at either of them but that's just me. If these guys were wastes of space who did no work, didn't come into the office etc then that'd be another story, but then the organization would sack them on disciplinary grounds as they are not working and meeting the requirements of their contracts.
Now if Ozil's contract contained specific performance related clauses that he'd need to meet that'd be a different story. I doubt anywhere on his contract it requires him to have a certain number of goals/assists per season to get paid his base salary. And I doubt he's not meeting at the minimum, the requirements of his contract otherwise he'd have been on his arse a long time ago. Whether he's good enough is not in questions as he obviously isn't anymore.
Coombs wrote:
Ozil is a fucking shitbird and doesn't deserve the paper I'm not writing this on.
Love how when it's footballers getting paid ludicrous millions everyone is suddenly a union organizer talking about their rights to a salary. They're corporate entities, not wage laborers. Ozil is owed nothing but disdain, if anything at all.
You can show your disdain to Ozil as much as you want mate, that's entirely up to you. The fact of the matter is though that he has a contract and is entitled to his salary as long as he is at the club, training, and making himself available any time the coach needs him. With all due respect, not you nor anyone else can change that. If you could the club would have done well to have hired you to do just that a long, long time ago.
Anyways, I think it's clear there is a lot of animosity directed at Ozil from many of our fans, and although I don't agree with it, I understand where it's coming from. I don't think this discussion will result those who hate him to be able to separate the apathy they feel towards his performances (or lackthereof) from the disgust they have towards him having a contract that large and his refusal to give it up. Much in the same way I don't believe his cult followers who followed him here from Madrid can ever see any fault in anything he does without excuses for his poor performances by blaming the players around him/ the formation etc for his failings.
This whole ordeal has polarised opinion of him to such an extent that there is hardly any middle ground when it comes to him. It's why the club management is winning (with Ozil losing) in it's bid to turn our fans against Ozil. On the other hand it's also why Ozil is winning in his refusal to accept being forced out of the club with his own fans defending everything he does. This whole thing is a mess and I don't think anyone comes out of it without any fault.
And with that I'm off. Love him, hate him, or anything in between. Luckily, like I said previously, in a few months this chapter can be closed and we can move on without him, and hopefully never be in this situation again. I've already spent more time than I'd have liked discussing someone who I don't particularly care for and who is basically a non entity for the remainder of his time here with us.
