Breaking the Offside Trap 01.06.09: Stick or Twist

Posted by Matt Snelling on 01.06.2009

With the transfer window now wide open, clubs at the top, and more importantly the bottom need to make the ultimate gamble - whether to spend money now or end up paying later

Speculate to accumulate, or in other words - gambling. Trying to make more money by first investing, despite you knowing the inherent risks involved. Playing off the pro's of success against the cons of failure. It's a game we all play, and with 2009 now upon us and the January transfer window now open, football clubs everywhere will be deliberating whether to spend their money or play it safe. Decide whether to stick or twist.

With the majority of the leagues of Europe having reached the half way mark, the true challenges that each club faces for the season, be it at the top or bottom has been revealed. The month of January, when the transfer window is open allows clubs to make some crucial decisions on what, if any, choices they are going to take in order to help them achieve what they need. It is this time, when clubs need to take a calculated gamble on just how much they are willing to risk.



Those who have something to play for are the ones most likely to be thinking about investments and improvements, but it is those teams at the bottom who have the most to gain, and also the most to lose. For while teams at the top or those challenging for trophies may look to bring in that extra ingredient that they believe will help tip the balance in their favour in the pursuit for honours, it is those who are struggling who will be looking rather more longingly at the market.

For teams at the top, the old adage is often to adopt the strategy of ‘if it ain't broke, why fix it?' It may seem obvious, but the chances are that if you are in a position to be challenging for titles and cups then your team is probably, in the main, quite good. Thus, little, if any additions need to be made. Indeed, the gamble those at the top play, is whether or not a new signing will unbalance a side or upset the system that has thus far been working pretty well. Signings in English football like Rodney Marsh and Faustino Asprilla come to mind here. It is likely then that those at the very top will chose to ‘stick' and carry on with what they currently have.

Those at the bottom however, those are the teams likely to be seriously contemplating doing business in the next month. It's those teams, particularly in England, that need to take the ultimate gamble – whether to risk spending money because they can't afford to contemplate going down or not to spend money because they can't afford to contemplate the pitfalls of spending money and then losing out on the vast sums of wealth that come from being part of the Premier League. In many ways, you're damned if you do, and damned if you don't.

Intriguingly, if you deem that phrase to be appropriate, the economic climate that the world is now in may also have a large impact on how much business clubs are willing or indeed able to do. With belts tightening all over the world and in every sector of people's life, the bountiful sums of money that have been awash in football in recent times may not be as readily available as before. How much do many clubs actually have to spend in this window? Do we really have a buyer's market out there?

West Ham for one would appear to certainly not be buying. With their Icelandic ownership struggling to cover rising debts at home, their chief executive Scott Duxbury practically admitted that the entire squad is up for sale, if the right bids were to come in. "We must not be afraid of interest in, or bids for, our leading players. Each approach will be considered in terms of fee, fitness, form and where the manager thinks the player is in his career. A bid may be evaluated by the manager as allowing him to significantly improve his team."



With finances tight at many clubs, there may be a lack of willing investors out there, but that's unlikely, given that the stakes for survival are so astronomically high. For a number of clubs out there, relegation is simply not an option. Falling out of the cash-laden lands of the Premier League and into the depths below could potentially spell disaster for many teams out there. The prospect of relegation bringing with it unwelcome links to words such as administration, receivership and bankruptcy. No-one wants to be the next Leeds, and, given the current climate and even bigger amounts of money invested on wages and coming from TV money, there is the potential of falling even further than the Yorkshire club.

That is why people will spend. That is why clubs will be looking to invest in January. ‘Playing it safe' for the here and now won't cut it, it's ‘go out and spend money' or risk the drop. Last season in England is a case in point. Neither Reading nor Birmingham significantly strengthened in the January window, neither dipped their hands into their pockets and both paid the price. Fulham, under Roy Hodgson brought in several new names and millions of pounds worth of new ‘talent'. Going into the final day of the season they were not safe, how many of the players they had brought in had actually substantially altered the quality of the side? However they did stay up. They gambled and won.

The example of the signing of Erik Nevland used by Kevin McCarra, Chief Football writer for the Guardian Newspaper perhaps best epitomises the fine line that is trod at this time, between prudence and extravagance. As McCarra writes; ‘the forward has started only two matches since Roy Hodgson spent £1.8m to buy him from Groningen at the very end of the January 2008 window [however] Fulham fans will still not scorn the signing vehemently.

In the closing weeks of last season Nevland came off the bench to hit the clincher in 2–0 wins over Reading and Birmingham. Both teams were relegated, while Fulham preserved their status on goal difference. Nevland made a small yet measurable contribution and that is what managers yearn for now.'

It is why apparently ‘sound business practices' go out the window. Now of course football has never really been known for its adoption of sound business practices, but at this time of year, the weighing up game played by clubs goes crazy.

Both Newcastle United and Wigan Athletic risk losing an England centre forward in the summer for nothing. Come the summer, both the contracts of Michael Owen and Emile Heskey will have expired. Both would then be free to leave for any they should chose, without their club receiving a penny. Normally this would lead to a situation where both teams would be keen to sell, keen to offload a player now for a few million quid instead of seeing a prize asset leave for nothing when their contract is up. Both however realise, that there is far more at stake than a few million here and there now. Both clubs realise that each player, a proven goal scorer at this level and a club talisman is worth more to the club in the long run, *if* they stay and then *if* the club survives. If they are sold for 2 to 3 million now it means putting at risk some 40 to 50 million in the summer.

This is why, more than ever it's a seller's market; clubs are unwilling to part with players that they realise can have a far more long term impact on what direction they are headed in. As McCarra says; ‘Options are always limited at this time of the year. The renowned footballers tend to be unavailable.' Thus any club taking a punt will in all likelihood end up paying way over the odds for any players they do want. People realise how desperate some are, and as we all know desperate men do desperate things. The market at this point can be ridiculously inflated.



West Ham should know this better than anyone. Two seasons ago they were all but down and out when their new Icelandic owners decided to splash the cash to avert the possibility of relegation from the top flight. The lengths they went to, lavishing millions of pounds on injury prone England reserve Matthew Upson and giving £72,000 of weekly salary to a no better than average, hatchet man fullback showed how common sense can go out the window when people become hysterical. In the long run it did work out, but things went down to the wire, and even then it was more the involvement of a certain Carlos Tevez that was the reason the club stayed up, rather than any investment in Nigel Quashie or Luis Boa Morte.

This time around, with economic conditions as they are, West Ham, just like a number of clubs will be struggling to come up with funds, as Duxbury recently confirmed, no funds would come from Gudmundsson. "The owner will not be in a position to add funds this transfer window but regardless we believe January is not the best time to be making any significant investments. As we know from experience, it is an inflationary market with teams paying top prices out of necessity."

The current weakness of the pound in relation to the Euro, as pointed out by Arsene Wenger, also means that clubs may be unwilling to dip into foreign markets given their money not being able to go as far. However, do not be fooled, credit crunch or no, clubs all over Europe, especially at the bottom of the Premier League will be gambling with their futures this month – to many, they simply cannot afford not to. The rewards on offer for staying in the league cloud and dominate all thinking, resources to secure those players seen as getting teams out of trouble must be scrounged from anywhere and everywhere they can be found.

The exception of course being Manchester City, who with the billions of Abu Dhabi United behind them are hell bent on splashing the cash. The plan in the summer, when the club was taken over was to attract more of the world's superstars, along the lines of those in the Robinho mould – those who would help propel the club into the higher echelons of the Premier League and into Europe. Given current form and position however, they just like everyone else scrabbling together at the bottom know that survival in the world's richest league is all important. If this takes tens of millions of pounds to do so, then so be it, it's the ultimate gamble that clubs cannot afford not to take.