World: Man United to pay Rooney £31.2m to leave

11

Arsene Wenger spoke to the media on Thursday. The subsequent headlines were predictable – he said Arsenal have to start quickly in their next fixture, he discussed his future, and he provided an injury update on his squad. ‘Twas ever thus.

One more story emerged from his press conference by late Thursday evening. The chances are that you have seen Wenger’s comments describing himself as “a priest” and a “specialist in masochism”. No wonder he got along so well with Louis van Gaal.

[smartslider3 slider=3]

“It’s a sacrifice of your life,” said the Frenchman, with regards to football management. “You have nothing else happening in your life.

“Basically you get 90 per-cent aggravation and 10 per-cent job satisfaction and you have to give everything in your life for that. You have to be ready for it.

“That’s what I always say to all the young people who want to go into this job. ‘Are you ready to sacrifice your life?’ It’s like a priest. You’re a football priest.”

The words were both reasonable and relatable, put across in a typically affable manner. And so you can imagine Mediawatch’s surprise when the Daily Express website grabbed hold of them and twisted them into something unrecognisable.

You see, they read the quotes above, and decided that the following headline represented them perfectly:

‘Arsene Wenger blasts young managers for lack of longevity: I’m like a football priest’

Why not just go the whole hog and claim that he called Eddie Howe a sh*thouse? It would be just as accurate.

 

Express delivery
Matthew Dunn clearly misses a trick in the newspaper edition of the Daily Express, mind. His headline on the Wenger quotes is ‘Arsene: I’m like a priest’.

There was presumably not enough space to explain how he told Marco Silva that he was ‘the daddy’.

 

The big pay off
Neil Custis has a Manchester United exclusive for you and I in The Sun, and it’s a bloody doozy.

‘MANCHESTER UNITED are ready to pay off Wayne Rooney this summer — and allow him to join another English club on a free transfer,’ he writes.

‘Rooney’s contract runs to summer 2019 but United will let him walk away.

‘They are even prepared to compensate Rooney for the remaining time on his £250,000-a-week deal to get him out of the door.

‘The striker, 31, would then become a free agent and United will not insist on any clauses restricting him from joining a Premier League rival.’

First off, why did no-one let Custis know that Rooney was last on £250,000 a week when he signed a new Manchester United contract in October 2010? His latest deal, signed in February 2014, boosted that figure to his actual current wage of £300,000 a week.

Secondly, paying someone off and letting them walk away are two very different things.

Thirdly, why is there no mention of how much said ‘pay off’ would actually be? Custis knows that United are ‘prepared to compensate Rooney for the remaining time’ on his contract, but he doesn’t state exactly how much they will compensate him by. He doesn’t even provide an estimate.

Perhaps that is because the figure would be batsh*t mental. Rooney is on a contract that earns him £300,000 a week. The contract runs until June 30, 2019. If United paid off the remainder of Rooney’s contract on July 1, the start of the summer transfer window, there would be 104 weeks left on his contract. United would need to pay compensation of £31.2million to end it and make him a free agent.

Heck, even taking Custis’ claim that Rooney earns £250,000 a week, that pay off would still be £26m. So United will be paying as much to get rid of Rooney as they did to sign Henrikh Mkhitaryan in the summer. Sure.

Even if Rooney and United came to some sort of an agreement which would see the £31.2m/£26m figure decrease somewhat, it still makes no sense. Why would United pay Rooney off in order to, in the words of Custis, ‘allow him to join another English club on a free transfer’?

Are we supposed to believe that Manchester United will spend more on paying off Rooney’s contract than they did on signing him in the first place? Are we supposed to believe that United will pay Rooney anything to end his contract when there would be a queue of clubs willing to pay a fee for him? Neil Custis has all the exclusive answers, but he’s not sharing them.

 

HotchPoch
With Luis Enrique’s announcement that he will leave Barcelona in the summer, speculation is rife as to who will replace him.

Many managers have been linked to the role, including Ernesto Valverde, Jorge Sampaoli and Arsene Wenger. So too has Mauricio Pochettino.

Adrian Kajumba of the Daily Mirror has the inside track:

‘Mirror Sport understands the Spurs boss’s links to Barca’s city rivals Espanyol – he played for and managed them – would not put him off the Nou Camp job.’

That will be the same Pochettino who responded to speculation over the Barcelona job by stating that he was “very happy” at Tottenham, and was “enjoying an exciting project” at White Hart Lane.

That will also be the same Pochettino who signed a new contract in May of last year, a deal which runs until 2021.

But forget all of that, and just remember that he is ‘not put off’. Which doesn’t actually mean he wouldn’t reject their overtures, just that he wouldn’t be disgusted if one of the best sides in club football showed an interest in him.

As an aside Mediawatch would like to state that their links to Mrs Mediawatch would not put them off Jessica Alba.

 

Home comforts
Says Paul Merson in his Sky Sports predictions for the weekend action in the Premier League:

“West Ham have struggled in front of their own fans and are a better side away from home.”

West Ham’s home record in the Premier League this season: P13 W5 D3 L5 Pts18
West Ham’s away record in the Premier League this season: P13 W4 D3 L6 Pts15

 

Rap it up
Stormzy visited Manchester United’s training complex at Carrington on Thursday. It has the world of football media rejoicing on Friday morning.

Why? Well, because The Sun can predict ‘What Stormzy may have rapped’ at Wayne Rooney. Because Stormzy, as a grime artist, can only converse in rap.

-Football 365

- Advertisement - [smartslider3 slider=4]