Deal or no deal? Djimi Traore…

So, we have some 15 players out of contract in the summer (or seeing their loans with Pompey end) it is almost time to decide who deserves a new contract and who does not deserve the drippings from my nose, well ours noses!

I was going to look at them all together, but I think I will do them one at a time… Simple question, and as the bearded one would say, ‘deal or no deal?’

Djimi Traore

I pity him, and not in the BA style ‘I pity da fool’ way.

He was on a hiding to nothing when he came here. No one really wanted him and most people had decided that he was no good from the off – I was as guilty of this as anyone, but I did eventually come round to the thought of ‘he could not have played over 100 games for Liverpool for nothing’…

In all fairness to the guy he did not actually do too bad for the club – I think my fondest memory of him was that fantastic acrobatic goal line clearance against Arsenal a couple of seasons back – and for me only suffered so much as he was not one of Jamie’s Dads ‘golden boys’, so he was then onto another hiding to nothing!

He is just now seeing out his contract, picking up what he can and that is not something I like and seems very much in keeping with the ‘most footballers are mercenaries’ thinking.

Word is he is on around £23,000 per week, so decent money to not do anything to earn it, which he cannot even do at Birmingham as he is injured – then again this is our fault here, or Sandra’s husbands fault, we gave him the money and the contract length so a player that is not actually as bad as made out, granted not good, but has been treated shabbily, he was going to take what he could?

That said he had the chance to leave but it would appear his excessive wage demands cost him the chance to have played regularly – so he is guilty of ‘money grabbing’…

Deal or no deal? No deal.

I say that he ‘could’ potentially still do a job, but we will want him off the wage bill, and these wages are massively higher than they warrant for what he does, and his heart is well and truly out of it now.

If a player with just months left on their contract is loaned out for the rest of the season this tells you something really!

These are my thoughts, what about yours? As always please share them below…

PLAY UP POMPEY!