Transfer window: The danger of overshadowing the game

CLUBS need money to stay in business. And without gate takings or sponsorship the only other way they can rise money is through player transfers. Modern football clubs along with their administrators and coaches are obsessed with competitive spending, with the idea that success can be bought. It is increasingly scary and vulgar these days. But we need to return to yesterday when these transfers were conducted in a respectful and gentlemanly manner.

That Dynamos could come to Bulawayo and sign players from Highlanders or vice versa is a sign that they respect each other. That AmaZulu went to each and every club they signed players from and paid what was demanded by these clubs is a sign that they had respect for the colleagues.

Back then, when there wasn’t even as much money in the game as we have today, every player moved only after the two clubs had reached an agreement. Nowadays players just want to have their way without considering the investment that their clubs would have put into their careers.

So, I ask – if every club just up and took any player they desire without so much as thank you, how will our clubs survive? How else will a small club that has invested what little it has in its coffers towards the development of Player A going to survive and produce another Player A if these players are just going for free?

In days gone by, club administrators drove from wherever to wherever and negotiated with their counterparts in good faith. Nowadays, we have scenarios where clubs are advising players they are interested in ‘buying out’ their contracts.

As football we must put an end to this. Failure to return to the basic tenets of mutual respect will see a lot more clubs going defunct. These so-called smaller clubs, the punching bags of the league cannot and will not survive if the bigger boys keep engaging in nefarious dealings to get the players they want.

And the players themselves need to revisit how they choose to leave their home clubs and move elsewhere. I am for players growing and moving to perhaps better paying clubs, but this must be done in an orderly fashion. Players need to stop holding their clubs at ransom when they have been convinced to move.

Maybe we need to go the European route and have clubs who speak to players without the knowledge or approval of the clubs that own these players being sanctioned!

The old days are gone when clubs or their coaches only ever needed one or two signings during a particular transfer window – one or two signings to shore up the team maybe because they have a long-term injury or that a player has left for another club. Not wholesale changes as we now often see!

Gone are the days when a player was signed to add value to a team and not to a coach specifically. This new trend is the reason why we have players coming in when there is a particular coach or leaving because a particular coach has arrived on the scene. Players came and went and so did coaches, but we had none of this craziness of players playing for that coach or coaches only picking that player – if a player has been by the club, that player has been bought to add value to the club’s performances.

Player transfers, like gate takings are the backbone of football club financing. If you take away either of these two, clubs will struggle to get by. My scepticism around the modern-day transfer window is out of concern – concern that we may be are buying or selling for all the wrong reasons.

I remember kudala players belonged to the club, but nowadays they seem to belong to coaches and agents or player managers. Kudala ku window I think it was maybe three players being signed at most and serious clubs used to just need to fill up one or two slots nje. Or maybe the differences are the caliber of administrators from yesteryear compared to the ones we have today?

Here is a situation, for instance, a pro player and his handlers will claim he must be from a club that has been paying his wages since his break into pro football, the same club where he happily signed a six-year contract when he made the grade.

More often than not this player’s head has been turned, in other words, instead of doing the professional thing and buckling down until a move materialises, he appears to be putting as much pressure as he can on his employers to sell rather than hold on.

Players must learn to be patient as should their handlers. Players must not try to force the issue– I know clubs are perfectly willing to sell them as they get the fee they want or expect from their investment in a player– and it is sad that many a timer, a player will leave one of the best clubs in the country to play in a lesser league.

Ultimately, though, football cannot stay where it was, with young and talented Zimbabwean footballers not getting the elite development they deserve because of unnecessary transfers.

Gold bless and may we keep loving football