Colo a go-go? Rumours regurgitated about Anfield interest.

Posted on October 28th, 2011 | 18 Comments |

Should Newcastle consider selling Coloccini?
Destination Anfield?
Rumours are once again doing the rounds about Liverpool interest in Newcastle United’s captain. Whether there’s and truth in those rumours remain to be seen but should we even consider letting our captain go?

The press has decided to regurgitate the story about Liverpool’s alleged intent to try and lure Fabricio Coloccini to Anfield in the January transfer window.

The Daily Mirror claims that Liverpool’s Director of Football Damien Comolli personally led a team of heavily armed scouts in a black ops mission to St James’ Park to watch our captain in action, although they don’t appear to have any quotes from anyone important to back that up.

If it’s true then I’m guessing they’ll come in with a decent offer and a salary that we won’t be able to match.

Colo may not want to leave Newcastle of course but, as one of the few remaining über-salaried players at the club, I’m sure Mike Ashley will give much consideration to the right offer.

But should we let him go for the ‘right’ offer or should we work extra hard to keep him?

We have after all already lost a lot of experience by way of Barton, Nolan and Enrique and yet we have survived. Prospered even. For me, Colo has been the standout player so far this season, but then again so was Barton last season and his departure doesn’t seem to have unduly affected the team.

Colo is after all 29, although I suspect that age isn’t the primary consideration for Ashley. Shola was given a new contract at 30, although his salary will be some way short of Coloccini’s, which is probably the significant factor.

In general, I have to say I agree with Ashley’s policy of scouting for relatively undiscovered talent that can be bought and salaried ‘on the cheap’, but I’ve always thought that there’s a balance to be struck with this sort of thing. At the risk of sounding a bit like a global-warmist, I also wonder whether there’s some sort of ‘tipping point’ where getting rid of the older, wiser and high-salaried players starts to have a seriously detrimental affect on the team.

In terms of the tactical areas of the team, defence would appear to be the area in which we can least afford to lose a player and I’d rather that we were adding to it than subtracting from it.

We’re not going to get a silly, Andy Carroll sort of offer for Coloccini, even if we adjust that for the fact that strikers in general go for sillier money then defenders. But if the earlier rumours were to be believed an offer of £10m-£12m could be on the cards.

So ultimately we have to ask: is Colo worth £10m-£12m and £60k-£70k/week to us?

NUFCBlog Author: Hugh de Payen I'm a baby-boomer of the punk rock persuasion, currently exiled in Somerset for crimes committed in a previous life where locals keep trying to poison me with something called 'scrumpy'. Hates sprouts, coat-hangers, Cilla Black, ornaments, Steven Seagull movies and 50 Cent (he's not worth 10). Hugh de Payen has written 634 articles on this blog.

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Comment on this post

18 Responses

  2. Colo is the man who holds our entire team together! He is the link between the foreign players and english players in the dressing room.

    He is our captain, our leader, in my opinion our best player! We cannot afford to let him go! It really would be suicide; especially when we should be looking to finish as high as possible this season and build upon our fantastic start!

    Alan smith is on 60k per week and his contract will be finished at the end of the season. Let’s use the money saved on his wages to supplement a new deal for Colo. We need him in our side.

  3. Who the hell would we replace him with for that price??????????????????? He is one of our best ever Defenders and has a proven partnership with Saylor!! If we want Europe next season he HAS to stay. Please extent his contract NUFC!!!!!!!!!!!

  4. Collo in my option, is worth just as much in defence as shearer was in attack.
    He is the centre of all traffic, if we lose him, not only will we lose direction, stability and organisation but we lose the best central defender in europe and all self respect as a club.

    Selling collo is like letting a casino owner have sex with our wife because we owe him money.

    Let us not think about selling him but think of the look on the sour faces of Enrique and Carroll when their tapping up of our players turns sour.

  5. At the moment Liverpool are a bit of a mixed bag – hardly setting the premier league alight, but getting Colo could be the switch that makes them trade places with us. Do we really want to give a close rival the edge over us by giving them such an influential player? There’s more than just a players fee & salary at stake here. I think they should be knocked back – its time we stopped handing our possible European places to rivals!

  7. Collo is in contract talks – and as I said yesterday he has not (yet?) accepted Cashly’s offer. This reminds us of the asbo & Nolan cases – older high paid players offered good money but shorter contracts than they wanted.
    The idea that any delay is due to his agent being in Argentina doesn’t realy hold water in these days of emails & internet.
    Collo’s will be 30+ when his contract expires – will he be worth £60k per week then?
    With a 3 year contract will he be worth £60k at 33? Will he have a decent transfer value then?

    On balance, looking over the next few years, I’d say take a decent offer (£12m) save his wages and get in 2 decent younger players.
    Otherwise offer one extra year on the same money and he can run our defence for the next 2 and a half seasons – then be young enough to end his career with a decent bosman.

  8. Wow – we have had a good start and maybe have some good players – so of course the “big clubs” are going to want to buy them all! News story – NOT! Too many lunchtimes in the hacks bar unable to come up with real news, methinks.
    I strongly suspect that the sale of Colo would result in Pardew leaving the club and I don’t think that double loss is something that even Ashley would reckon is good business for £10 million.

  9. Tiote is a different case – young with a long contract – but money talks. No good criticising manure, even they loose players to big offers – that’s football these days.
    Our best bet (and every other team in this situation) is to act first, give a hands off warning and slap a huge price on his head (£20+) – and hope for the best.

  10. So, we would loose Pardew? mmmm.
    I would hate to loose the stability we have achieved, but I’d consider paying his fare back to London (2nd class of course).

  11. Collo has been great but now Liverpool have the big lads Coates and Kelly working their way into the team he would get in the way of their introduction. If Agger stays fit he would be a nailed on starter so places would be tight.

  12. About the global warming thing, just look at Arsenal ( whos model we are supposedly following ) to see what happens when you sell off too much older experienced players and continuously replace them with young potential. You go from having an *invincible* team that can go 49 games unbeaten to a *nearly team*. There is definatly a balancing act between young players and older heads.
    I admit Carr and Ashley have managed to bring in some exceptional talant on comparitivly little money but how long can they continue to do so before bringing in the odd Eboue, Koschelny, Fabianski etc. Younger cheaper isn’t always better in my view.

  13. Exactly! Its ok bringing in a team for the future, but if you get rid of ALL the ones who are making it a success now, the future will never come. Why should we be the premier league academy?

  14. Liverpool got their fingers burnt with their silly money offer for Carroll. They refused to do the same with Enrique, but then he wanted to go, so they got away with it. I don’t think Collo wants to go that badly, that he will make it easy for Liverpool to get him on the cheap, and I don’t think they are prepared to offer the silly money to turn even Ashley’s head. If Liverpool offer Ashley $20M and offer Collo $80k/w (like Carroll), then everyone would be happy to see it happen (even most supporters wouldn’t begrudge Collo or Ashley making hay while it shines). But, I can’t see Liverpool being that silly again, not with the FIFA Financial Fairplay thingy breathing down their necks, and both their previous forays northward yielding so little joy for them (so far). I think Collo wants to stay, and Ashley wants him to as well – I think he will. I think Liverpool know it and won’t even bother to make an attempt.

  15. Tsunki says:
    October 28, 2011 at 1:44 pm

    “Exactly! Its ok bringing in a team for the future, but if you get rid of ALL the ones who are making it a success now, the future will never come. Why should we be the premier league academy?”

    Profit?

  16. What I’d like to know is how the Feck they can afford to keep buying at the prices they do and give out the wages they do as well.

    They have to come a cropper at some point surely.

  17. Grumpy Old-Toon says:
    October 28, 2011 at 3:08 pm

    “What I’d like to know is how the Feck they can afford to keep buying at the prices they do and give out the wages they do as well.”

    Well, they generate over double the revenue that we do Grumpy, and they aren’t owned by Ebenezer Scrooge either.

  18. Grumpy Old-Toon says: “how the Feck they can afford to keep buying at the prices they do and give out the wages they do as well. They have to come a cropper at some point surely”
    – don’t know, ask a Leeds suporter Grumpy!
    Just live the dream!