Where has the figure £32m come from?
Written by Jim Boardman
Tuesday, 05 July 2005
It would be hard to find a back page of today's national newspapers that didn't show a picture of Steven Gerrard leaving Melwood yesterday afternoon. And all of those articles seem to have "exclusives" about Chelsea making a £32million bid for Gerrard.
Chelsea currently have a suspended three-point deduction hanging over them after being found guilty of trying to tap-up Arsenal's Ashley Cole. In that incident they met the player without permission.
Right now though Chelsea are conducting their transfer business through the press. Chelsea can make as many bids as they like, there's no requirement for Liverpool to tell their player about them. So telling all of the journalists on the national sports pages is another way of letting the player know they want him. As all the papers know the bid that was made - or seem to - it's pretty obvious that they've been told about the bid.
Some of the reports are also claiming that Real Madrid have made a bid, although Madrid have only said publically that they would go for the player if he handed in a transfer request.
What Liverpool managed to achieve yesterday was proof that they are not at fault should Gerrard leave. He's been offered the deal he asked for, he's been told he's wanted, he was offered a deal three times over last season and each time held back.
What Gerrard's advisors have managed to acheive is to make Gerrard lose yet more popularity with sections of the Reds support as patience starts to wear out. Whatever the truth of the matter, unless Gerrard signs a new deal and publicly explains what happened in the last seven days he is going to lose more and more popularity by the day.
Liverpool are now in a win-win situation - they've offered Gerrard a deal, the one he asked for, they've got the biggest trophy available to them in the trophy room, they've signed new players with more on the way - Gerrard can't leave without criticism. He can stay, sign a new deal, and then go into the new season with his head held high. If he stays Liverpool keep the player, and more importantly prove to any other players that they won't stand for too much messing, and won't be lied about in public.
If Gerrard does leave, and goes for the reported fee, Liverpool lose an excellent midfielder, but have the funds to buy players that Benitez can turn into excellent players.
From what we can gather Gerrard is more likely to sign a deal now than he has been for some time, but SFX are pushing like crazy to get him to leave and bring them much bigger commission. A statement is likely at some point this morning.