Middlesbrough chairman wrong to air dirty laundry about Viduka and Yakubu
I just don’t find it appropriate for a club chairman to publicly criticise players or comment on such matters out in the open. It’s good press, but because it’s just one person berating the other, it quickly turns into a slanging match and we get half-truths, which isn’t fun to begin with.
Gibson is right about a couple of things - Viduka wasn’t worth a 3-year, high-salary contract and Yakubu wasn’t exactly on fire at the end of last season. However, this is no reason to make comments that will invite criticism and have your own club’s name dragged in mud.
Spend that time loosening Middlesbrough’s purse strings so Alves can come in quickly.
If he has to comment, why not reveal exact figures of what Middlesbrough offered Viduka and what Viduka asked for in return? I agree that football should not about the money, but if Gibson had simply shown (through numbers instead of whining like a girl about it) us how greedy Viduka is, it would have made much more sense.
As things stand, we have to figure out what Middlesbrough’s gate income is (was that one game’s income or the whole season’s income? if it’s the latter Boro are in serious trouble) and then do the math.
As for Yakubu - it could have had something to do with ambitions and a lack of patience, which is too evident in football today.
[Source: Sky Sports]
Also read: 2007 Summer Premier League Transfers
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Gibson did put the figures. £7.5 million per season for gate receipts and Viduka wanted half that per season. Not clever business for a club our size.
We don’t want to end up like Leeds. Given the bad press that Gibson bizarrely received I hardly think you can blame him for letting us all know!
Steve Gibson had every right to have a go at Mark Viduka being greedy because Viduka has been having a pot at him all the summer in the papers. The Boro goalie,[ his mate is viduka] has also been mouthing it.
To us Boro fans Steve is GOD.
the dudes up top are bang on.
Steve Gibson & Middlesbrough FC have taken a bashing from Viduka all summer, with him trying to insinuate that Boro didn’t do enough to keep him and didn’t make him feel wanted enough, as if he was whiter than white. All Gibbo did was to simply put his side across, I don’t see what the problem is, I think he did it in a very calm, dignified and professional manner.
When it comes to Yakubu, all Mr Gibson did was to state why he is being sold - because he switched off for no apparent reason in the second half of the season. What is so shell-shocking about that? It is a fact that can be seen quite clearly if you simply take the time to look at the scoring records for not just last season, but also the season before.
In my eyes, Steve Gibson has done nothing more than give his own take, as owner and chairman of Middlesbrough FC on rather major events that have transpired over the past few months. Other chairmen, owners & managers say a lot worse on a weekly basis, but I don’t see anyone raising any queries over their ‘appropriateness’.
There are no half truths in what was said. Viduka was always leaving the club, even back in January he knew the club weren’t going to give him what he wanted, he played a blinder for the rest of the season to ensure that another club would come in and meet his demands.
Yakubu only ever played for half a season whilst on our books post January he was nowhere to be seen, the same happened at Portsmouth. £11.25M for a player that doesn’t care, that’s a brilliant bit of business in my eyes. Two mercenaries, who performed when they felt like it, that we are better off without.
Yakubu says he wanted to play for a team in EUrope, perhaps if he’d performed for us he we might have been there. His performances for us in Europe were pitiful.
word.
I must apologise for this being an uber-late comment… but you know.
Now, I know Gibson didn’t make the figures particularly clear, but he gave away enough over the course of two interviews to make it clear that our overweight 34 year old Aussie wanted somewhere in the region of over £75,000 per week. Now, for a club who doesn’t particularly like these prima donnas (indeed, I believe our highest paid player remains Alen Boksic), thats not what we would offer.
They were basically just clear the air talks. We’d come under a lot of bad press following the Viduka affair - Why didn’t you offer him a contract? - and Gibson was giving his side of the story. We had offered contracts in good time, and with good money, but apparently the sausage rolls were just cheaper in Newcastle.
Regarding the Yak, well that was just explaining why he’d gone. The fact is, he’d been terrible for the past 7 months, and Gibson was explaining why - the so-called ‘passion’ to play in Europe, and so going to Middlesbrough mk. II in Everton. The desire to be at a ‘top team’, and so going to a ‘top’ mid-table side. And to be honest, the sausage rolls were again probably cheaper.