Out of contract players

Why can't our club still not get to grips with the Bosman ruling after all these years?

Other teams either get players on long term deals if they want to stay or make decisions to sell them so that they get a decent fee for them.

It seemed like they had sussed it for a couple of seasons but we again seem to be at the stage of losing players for zilch or peanuts.  It has happened so many times.....Niall McGinn, Ryan Jack, Kenny McLean, Ryan Fraser, Chris McGuire, Kevin McNaughton.

Teams like Hibs and Dundee Utd have made a fortune by selling players but we always seem to let our players just run their contracts down and leave for next to nothing.  We even managed to get just £1.4M for Hayes which seems ridiculous compared to players of similar quality in that Irish squad.

I think it could be very strongly argued that we have got to grips with it under McInnes. We needed stability and professionalism and that seems to have happened to a large® extent.

Lewis, Rooney, Hayes, Jack, McGinn, Logan, Considine, Wright, Shinnie etc have all signed extended contracts when not expected to.

When do we stop talking about Hibs in this regard given it is a decade (and a different era in Scottish fitba in reality) since they sold their - very good assets - for a fortune.

If we'd extended McGinn, Jack, McLean or McGuire's contract for any length of time we'd have received no more than £1M for any of them. The demand isn't there for players of that level as they all had their limitations. Sevco wouldn't get £1M for Jack if they listed him now because he simply isn't worth it. If he'd kicked on in the way he should have then he could have gone to an EPL club, but he didn't. Had he, though, he would still have been contracted to us and we'd have got the transfer fee as it would happened in the last couple of years. As it stood, we effectively let him go because he was easily replaced.

The only player you've named there was Fraser. It was 5 years ago. Lewis is the only player of recognisable value that could feasibly earn us a decent transfer fee and he is already had his contract extended. There are no other players who hold a value of >£1M in our team apart from Christie.

Robertson, Armstrong, Gauld at Utd, Brown, Fletcher, O'Connor at Hibs were all very good players and better than anything we have produced other than Fraser. If Wright happens to be the next Fraser - and I have my doubts - then we'd have already dealt with that by signing him.

You have to weigh up the cost of giving a player a new contract versus the cost of losing them. Jack's value went down in the two years additional contract that we gave him, but he arguably provided good value in that period. McLean would be a similar case if he'd signed a new deal. Neither would bring in huge fees.

I'd agree with Rico here, I think we've done very well recently and the money for Hayes was pretty decent considering the market at the time. Just because other internationals went for more wasn't necessarily down to AFC being "cheap" but maybe there weren't many clubs after him so there was no "bidding war"

The only club really making money from transfers in Scotland right now is the one giving it's players the "high level" exposure that attracts interest from clubs with money. Face it, that's life at the moment!

It's not simply a case of giving a player a new contract, they've got to want it. The bulk of our first team players are signing new contracts well before they go into the final year of their existing contracts, that to me would suggest we're doing all we can to offer new contracts to players like McLean and Jack, they just want to go elsewhere and would rather get a big signing on bonus in their hipper rather than allow us to get a decent transfer fee.