Pat Nevin: 'The bottom line is that Fletcher has signed a legally binding contract'

Published on Saturday 7 February 2009 18:58

THE ONLY thing that appeared to be lower than the stock market last week was Steven Fletcher's bottom lip. It is an unusual occurrence these days to see a football player fail to get his way on moving to a bigger club, even if in this case it is likely to be no more than a short-term delay for the talented striker.

Clearly he is disappointed, but hopefully he won't behave like a spoilt child and refuse to play. That said, everyone at Easter Road must be secretly concerned that he will be just that bit less motivated than before because of those deep feelings of injustice.

The bottom line is that he has signed a legally binding contract and he should honour it, just as the club would honour their side of the bargain if he were unable to work because of injury or illness. The shades of grey come in to play if the player feels there was an implicit, if unwritten, agreement that he would be allowed to move on to further his career if a substantial offer was made and he fancied the move.

Maybe at this point the agent representing Fletcher when he signed the original deal should question whether or not he should have demanded an automatic release clause at a prearranged figure. It is common knowledge that Hibs tend to play hardball – Scott Brown and Steven Thomson eventually only left for top-of-the-market prices when Celtic and Rangers previously went shopping in Leith.

In the midst of the horse-trading it has to be said that Gordon Strachan has once again behaved in a thoroughly principled manner. He played it by the book and for once it didn't seem like a big club deliberately unsettling a player, more a by-product of a serious and open bid. Even this could make Fletcher angry, knowing that honesty hasn't worked when most deals that do go through involve clandestine meetings and players acting up, feigning injury or disrupting the dressing room.

Almost every player will find themselves in a similar situation at some point in their careers. My own fury went off the scale at Everton when new manager Howard Kendall appeared unwilling to sell me to a Premiership club but was quite relaxed about accepting the same price as long as it was from Tranmere Rovers or, preferably, Galatasaray.

It might have suited the club for me to be shipped off to Istanbul but it certainly didn't suit my young family or me. Suddenly dark thoughts of what the real reasons might be for getting me out of the way began to surface. Was it the fact that I was PFA chairman and considered a troublemaker after the recent ballot for strike action? Whatever the conspiracy theories I came up with late at night, they became all-consuming for a short while and that is precisely where Steven Fletcher's head is spinning to right now.

There will be other fears that probably didn't even enter his mind two months ago. He is a first choice at an SPL club and an international player who is coveted both north and south of the Border, but like every other player he is always only one kick away from a career-ending injury. If he had got the move to Celtic last week he could be confident of driving Mercs or BMWs for the rest of his life. If he is unlucky between now and the summer he, like many before him, could be driving minicabs late at night to earn a crust before he is 30. Thoughts like this could be torturing him and to a degree it is understandable in that he was so tantalisingly close to lifetime security.

What if Strachan packs it in at the end of the season? That isn't beyond the bounds of possibility if Celtic lose the league and he gets fed up with the ensuing stick from the fans. Will Celtic still want Fletcher then? Rangers are having serious financial difficulties right now, who's to say Celtic or the other interested clubs will not find themselves in the same situation in a few months time. Who is going to stump up 3m then?

Mixu Paatelainen has got his work cut out to get his star player's head straight even if he decides not to stay in a huff with the club as a whole. If he has the right attitude and personality he will shrug it off as soon as he crosses the white line. Certainly he seems more like the type who will be miffed for a short time but is unlikely to swan about half-heartedly for the rest of the season, while jumping out of tackles just in case.

Mixu will doubtless tell him how wonderful a striker he is, how the deal fell through because of that lot upstairs and was nothing to do with him. He might also delicately suggest that any summer move to Glasgow, along with the value of any contract he could command, will be placed in jeopardy if he doesn't have a good end to the season. After all, Strachan seemed less than impressed with a certain Derek Riordan's attitude while he was at Celtic.

Whatever the rights and wrongs of the transfer window, it has a habit of creating these tensions. Last week down south, however, Sam Allardyce found a creative way of dealing with them and motivating an agitated star. In an eerily similar set of circumstances, his centre forward Roque Santa Cruz was thwarted in his ambitions to move from Blackburn to moneybags Manchester City. Instead of trying to soften the blow with kind words to the Paraguayan, big Sam instead went for some heavy emotional blackmail.

In a nutshell he said to Santa Cruz, and crucially also relayed to the press: "You will get your move at the end of the season, but if you personally put the effort in between now and then, we will avoid relegation and this will save the jobs and livelihoods of your team-mates." Having spent years in football dressing rooms, it is impossible to underestimate the pressure the manager has just put on the player to give 100% in every single game from now on. Note to Sam and Mixu, though, if you make these promises do not go back on them in the summer. If you do, then you really might have a dangerous striker on your hands, but not the kind that scores goals.