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Ulf Ottosson

Francis - still want him to stay

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Yes Ok he''s being a bit of a prat but I still rather he stayed for a couple of reasons:

1) Whatever the fee we get we WILL NOT get anyone as good as him as a replacement FACT

2) He will not be the first player messed around buy his agent and Portsmouth behavior has not helped either and he hasn''t come out and explictly said "I don''t want to play for Norwich" (Yet).

3) If we sell him we are Squad is looking more and more Championship if you know what I me only Huckerby, Ashton and Green are real quality.

4) If sends out the wrong signals to other Clubs wanting our other star players. We should not be a selling Club

 

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[quote]Yes Ok he''s being a bit of a prat but I still rather he stayed for a couple of reasons: 1) Whatever the fee we get we WILL NOT get anyone as good as him as a replacement FACT 2) He will not be the ...[/quote]

For crying out loud, Francis doesn''t want to be here! We all know how he did at Southend - rubbish - and he''s reportedly approached Nigel to tell him his head isn''t in it.

1) Any replacement we can get (even Jason Jarrett, who I think is tailor made to replace Damo) playing at 100% would be better than Damo playing at 50% (FACT)

2) No he hasn''t. But he''s clearly asked to be withdrawn from the Colchester squad, which is just as good in my mind.

3) Right, so Shackell is not top Championship level quality? Or Safri? And Colin is only apparently the future Dutch national right back! No quality there! Oh and we''ve got Gary Doherty who''s a Republic of Ireland international. Can''t be that good! Then I''ve missed the two England youth internationals in Jarvis (who scored a wonder goal versus Liverpool, no quality there!) and Ian Henderson. And another full Northern Ireland international in Paul McVeigh. And then there''s the Canadian International Jim Brennan. No quality whatsoever! Damo playing at 50% is not even mid-table Championship quality. We all saw that at Fulham. And we''re not in the Premiership anymore, mate. Let''s get back there before we worry about Premiership quality. Right now, we need Championship quality, and we''ve got that by the bucketload.

4) When have we given out any signals about being a selling club? Our club has continually denied having to need to sell, but admitted if they don''t want to be here, they can''t stop them. Damo doesn''t want to be here! Cash him in, and bring in two or three quality players with the cash.

I think you need to wake up and smell the lima beans, mate.

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No he must either be left to rot in the reserves or got out of the club asap.

 

The guy is refusing to play for us in friendlies and has made it obvious through his behavior and performances last season that he does not want ot play for us. Good riddance to bad rubbish so far as I am concerned!

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[quote]For crying out loud, Francis doesn''t want to be here! We all know how he did at Southend - rubbish - and he''s reportedly approached Nigel to tell him his head isn''t in it. 1) Any replacement we can g...[/quote]

Good post Andrew, spot on mate.

Onwards and upwards.

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Get a bit of perspective everyone.   City will always be a better team with Damo than without - if we get less than £2m for him we will not be able to buy a 10 goal a season replacement to fill the gap - and there will be a gap.

Realistically how many of you have applied for a promotion or different job you want and NOT let your mind wander off your current role as you anticipate the extra money status responsibilty how to impress? Does your attention slip off the job when there potential jobs cuts thatmay affect you.  Do you consider your current job/team mates or your own needs? Exactly.    

Why is the situation with Damo any different?  It seems to me that the club acted responsibly by telling him that pomopey were still sniffing around and that has unsettled him.  Wouldnt you be too?  Is he being more honest than we would be telling his manager his frame of mind is not right? 

I am not supporting Damo here but this fanciful notion of loyalty in football is not existant between clubs, managers, agents federations etc etc etc.  There is only one remaining (and its  unilateral) display of loyalty - and that is from the fans towards the club; and that is not usually reciprocated either.

All players have a shelf life at a club and I do think the fans have reacted badly towards an every day occurrence because of our unrealistic expectations of players sense of belonging to a football club. 

If Damo goes he goes and I will say goodbye & thanks for the goals,  if he stays & plays, like flem or eddy last season, I will not boo his appearance in a yellow shirt (as very unlikely that willbe now)   What the club must do is keep damo informed and ensure that if he leaves it is on terms that suit us and not damo.   

OTBC  

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To bring you all up to speed,  IT WAS WORTHY who axed him for Colchester (soucre: today''s EDP) not the 666 baby who asked not to play.

Worthy told him to go home and get his head ready for training today.

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[quote]Sorry but he is useless. He doesnt try, Jarrett therefore is better. IMO anyone who gives some effort would be a better replacement.[/quote]

We have to move away from this ''Effort is good mantra'' - I could get fit and would collapse with effort but it would make city a laughing stock.   It is the managements focus on effort that limits our ability to have the best team and tactics week in week out - worthy focus'' on effort players (flem, eddy, holt last season) and look at the cost.

Just because jarrett may try (and do we know he does?) does not make him better - it hardly worked for holt did it? and damo outshone holt every week - even without trying...

 

OTBC 

 

 

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We should cut our losses, and sell him. A few more games with him strolling around will mean no-one wants him, and the nearer we get to the end of his contract the lower his transfer price.

We might get £1m plus now, but how much would we get if he plays in the reserves or if it becomes clear he has no heart and is unprofessional - shades of Koumas?
He wouldn''t be the first player of talent to fade away, and he woudn''t be the first player whose contract the club had to buy out (if things go from bad to worse.)

It looks as if Francis and his agent have an inflated view of his capabilities, and with an "attitude" he becomes even lower in value.

Take the money, Worthy, and buy someone who wants to play!

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Yet again I find myself in agreement with Zipper. When I see all these comments by people saying ''off you go'' and ''we must ged rid of him now'' etc I fully understand where they are coming from but breathe a sigh of relief that they are on this message board and that others are running our club.

It seems obvious to me that what is happening is that Francis'' agent is desperately trying to engineer a move and Pompey are trying (successfully it would appear) to unsettle our player.

The agent is doing this to try and get his cut and Pompey are doing it to try and knock the price down. The point is that agents are ALWAYS trying to engineer moves and clubs are ALWAYS trying to knock the price down when they buy players.

If we cave in and let Francis go for a knock down fee then all we are doing is cutting down the amount of money we have to find a replacement - and however much people are pi***d off with his attitude we will sorely miss his goals from midfield.

Even worse though we will be sending out a sign that Norwich City are a pushover for other clubs and that whenever another club wants to get one of our players on the cheap all they have to do is unsettle him together with his agent and they will be able to do so.

Its a really difficult situation for the club, but in my opinion they have to stick to their guns and tell Pompey, Francis and his agent that he won''t be going anywhere unless our valuation is met and that if he throws his toys out of the pram he will be left to rot in the reserves.

Getting rid of an unhappy player whose heart isn''t in it at a knockdown price may seem like the right thing to do in the short term, but in the long term I think it would be disastrous.

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Sorry but I recently moved jobs.  In my notice period there were several crises at work and I stayed up all night for a couple because my colleagues needed me.

If I had teammates whose careers depended on staying in the prem not to mention the fans who paid my wages I would be able to amble around a football pitch with just a little more urgency than he showed for us at the end of last season.

I for one NEVER want to see him in a norwich shirt again.

His scoring record was mediocre before last season anyway.  The year we went up hughes outscored him by some margin.

Players with the attitude of Hucks + deano are what we want at this club.  Skill yes where possible but we will never amount to anything unless we get the spirit right.

We can''t buy a collection of individuals good enough to outclass other teams even though they don''t play as a unit.  We must have a team ethic and this bad apple should be shuved out of the door a.s.a.p.

Shame he could''ve been a legend instead he will be remembered for decades as an utter disgrace.

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Its a shame not every player has the guts to come out and speak against their agent, like Hucks did when we were trying to sign him. More players need to take control of their own lives and stop letting agents run the show - the situation with agents in this country is becoming a joke, and I was pleased to see that the FA wants to crack down on it... how successful they will be is another matter.

At the moment, we''re dealing with a lot of speculation and headline-grabbing tabloid nonsense.

If it turns out to be true, then fine, bye-bye Damo.  If its all been blown out of proportion, then welcome back Damo, do your best for us, and we''ll cheer you on.....

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I haven''t got a problem with him leaving but imo he let NCFC and our fans down big time last season and for that I can''t forgive him and I hope he is gone asap. He signed an extension to his contract only last year when he knew we would probably be relegated and it would have been nice if he''d at least have put more effort in last year to earn his extra dosh and maybe gave it at least until christmas to see if we had a good chance of getting promoted. Personally I think the championship is a better league to play in as it''s far more competitive and the prem is vastly overrated. I don''t for one minute believe all the bull that comes from footballers mouths that the premiership is the only place to play football, more like the only place to be if u want to earn loads of cash. What will happen if pompey go down next year? will he throw his toys out of the prem and ask to move again. Lets face it they''re no bigger club than us and only carry a slightly lower risk of being relegated. If he goes there I for one hope he gets his comeuppence and gets relegated again.

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I personally would prefer him to leave for a reasonable fee. If we do not get a reasonable offer then I am not sure what is for the best, whilst I understand the argument that we should not be pushed around by an agent (as I suspect Damo doesn''t have the brainpower to come out with most of the things that have been said) I do question what the best thing is for the club in the long run. If he maintains his current attitude he will not play for us again and as such it will be a very expensive way of making a point and I''m not sure we could make much better use of his wages.

On the playing side I am not too sure he would be a huge loss, I realise goal scoring midfielders are not cheap or easy to find but I do not feel he will consistently score goals. He missed more chances than he scored and his all round play is not that good and he is frequently guilty of losing the ball and misplacing passes. Of more concern to me is the fitness levels of our other 2 main centre-mids, Safri (who I think is a quality passer and tackler) and Jarret.

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[quote]Get a bit of perspective everyone. City will always be a better team with Damo than without - if we get less than £2m for him we will not be able to buy a 10 goal a season replacement to fill the ga...[/quote]

Sorry Zipper, although I find myself agreeing with 99% of the time I couldn''t disagree more on this.  I will except that some people may reduce their efforts in the latter stages of employment when they feel they are in a dead-end job but on most occasions people still want to do their best, it''s called pride.  You then have to take into account that is not a run-of-the-mill job, Francis is doing the best job in the world, whether it''s playing for Colchester or Manchester United, he is being paid to play football.  Does Francis have no pride?  He shew no interest for months and he will leave this club as a hate figure, more so than anyone else I can remember.  Avoiding relegation would have been twice the ahievement of winning the Championship, yet he shew little or no interest and that is poor whether he is playing in Yellow and Green or not.  If he couldn''t motivate himself for the biggest challenge of his career what can motivate him?

 

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[quote]Sorry Zipper, although I find myself agreeing with 99% of the time I couldn''t disagree more on this. I will except that some people may reduce their efforts in the latter stages of employment when th...[/quote]

I am happy to agree to disagree on this one saint. 

Perhaps more than anything I cant get myself excited over whether Damo stays or goes; or whether it is the agent or Damo giving the agent instructions to orchestrate the move.  Thats is the footballing merry-go-round nowadays and was always going to happen when the club got more successful - I have just expected from the day we got promoted.  Players control which clubs the play at but the club encourage it by paying stupid signing on fees and ''loyalty bonus'' for LEAVING a club! 

Worthy and the club appear to be playing it right to me, removing the player from the spot light and telling the fans the truth of the matter that its the agent making the noises, not necessarily the player.

What does surprise me is that people were happy for 18 months to take his non committal approach to the game coming to a crescendo just before his injury only to slate him for playingin the same manner for the last 6 month with us and assuming its all linked to a transfer (which may be the case, who really knows? and if it is I dont care because that is how football is nowadays - power with the players and no one else) 

In my eyes the club need a quick resolution one way or another.  He stays, in which case he will probably still be part of our best midfield pair (with safri) or he leaves.  Either way the club will still be here and we will still be competitve this year. 

If he does leave, the club need cash now to enable us to get a replacement - and boy will we need one - as we were already a 2 midfielders short and finding three in a month will not be easy.  A player swap from Pompey is not good enough nor is payment by installments or performances - our promotion prospects are best served by spending the money this year rather than next.   

 

OTBC

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I Can''t believe anybody would want him to stay! He obviously has no back bone that is why his agent is doing all the talking for him, why won''t he come out and say he wants to leave, at least Green is honest and can talk for himself and say that he might not be here if the right offer comes along, that in my mind is acceptable but why does francis keep on stringing us along?

And by the way we bought him for £200,000 I am sure we can find ample replacments for £1.5m plus after all, we did win the first division with him and Holt!!! Enough said surely!!!

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[quote]I am happy to agree to disagree on this one saint. Perhaps more than anything I cant get myself excited over whether Damo stays or goes; or whether it is the agent or Damo giving the agent instruct...[/quote]

Again I am going to agree with you Zipper about the 18 months of non committal, I feel that Francis has always been inconsistent at best for his whole City career.  Even in the Championship winning year he hardly set the Championship alight and there were occasions that Mulryne was preferred in the team ahead of him.

As I stated before though, I really don''t understand how he could not motivate himself and that sort of attitude will prevent him being a top player.

I can see the benefits of having him in the team this season but in all honesty I would rather have the money for him. 

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Although he can be a brilliant player (when HE wants to be!) he has to go, it gone too far now surely?.

I''ve noticed on Portsmouth fan sites today, that even they are now asking the same questions as we are, and he ain''t even signed for them yet!.

His bloody agent has dug him into deep hole, and its getting deeper every second he stays here.

What a mess.

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We all wish to advance in our career paths, and one would assume Mr D Francis is no exception.  I think Mr D Francis should now be allowed to depart this fine club to pastures new.

BUT!.....I feel before he doth depart, he should ''turn the other cheek'' and allow Leon to bid him a friendly farewell........ OTBC ;~) 

PS. I think his agent requires a swift kick up the "Jacksy" with a size 12 hob-nail boot - to assist and accelerate him on his merry way!

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Jim Brennan a Canadian international ! For a large country they must be very short of players. He looked completely out of sorts against colchester, lacking idea''s and acting at times like he didn''t even want the ball

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