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+----- Thread: Grass, greener, other side (/showthread.php?tid=12186)
Grass, greener, other side - 4evaabaggie - 19-03-2023
Reports on newsnow that Sheffield Utd and West Brom are interested in signing England international.
Upon reading the article, Crystal Palace maybe willing to sell Sam Johnstone for £5million, he has barely played this season.
Sam thought he might be playing premier league football, instead Palace played a blinder, sign him on for free, sell him a year on for a sizeable fee.
He has harmed his international career by not playing, damaged our promotion hopes by leaving and the grass was not any greener. No1 at Albion playing every week in clear sight of Southgate or getting splinters at Palace, out of sight out of mind.
He made a poor choice but I would take him back.
Anyone else agree?
RE: Grass, greener, other side - Dingle-Dingle - 19-03-2023
Not for a fee, no. Refused offers, and ran his contract down.
The kids look like doing well. Rebuild with them.
DD#No1
RE: Grass, greener, other side - 4evaabaggie - 19-03-2023
DD, I can see your point, a lot of players do this but I honestly think if he had stayed we would be pushing Burnley not chasing the play off scraps. No disrespect to teams in the zone but achieving promotion via the play offs is never satisfactory and feels like crumbs from the top table.
Players over the years have left us thinking their better than us or their careers will go further leaving us than it would with us only to find they would have been better staying put. I only hope the academy players can look at the players that left and flopped and realise they can build a career and team here with us.
Alex and Josh are at the beginning of their careers and are doing very well but I feel Sam would have bred more confidence in the defence and those draws would have been wins, on the plus side the results got rid of dinosaur football and Bruce.
RE: Grass, greener, other side - Salopbaggie - 20-03-2023
(19-03-2023, 19:18)4evaabaggie Wrote: DD, I can see your point, a lot of players do this but I honestly think if he had stayed we would be pushing Burnley not chasing the play off scraps. No disrespect to teams in the zone but achieving promotion via the play offs is never satisfactory and feels like crumbs from the top table.
Players over the years have left us thinking their better than us or their careers will go further leaving us than it would with us only to find they would have been better staying put. I only hope the academy players can look at the players that left and flopped and realise they can build a career and team here with us.
Alex and Josh are at the beginning of their careers and are doing very well but I feel Sam would have bred more confidence in the defence and those draws would have been wins, on the plus side the results got rid of dinosaur football and Bruce.
Normally we agree 4ever, but I am with Dingle on this one, as much as I would like to see him back, he ran his contract down got a big signing fee, because he wanted bigger and better well, now he has bigger and better, so let him enjoy (watching) it, unless he comes back on a free. Even then it begs the question of what message that sends to our up and coming players and what president it sets for other first team players. In all honesty I can see him staying in the Prem anyway.
RE: Grass, greener, other side - Minizin - 21-03-2023
Why would anyone blame him for moving on? Major pay rise, leaving a club drifting downwards with Bruce. He’d have been mad to stay.
Would be worth considering if we get promoted - Palmer and Griffiths are fine for the championship (I’m not sure if Lai can enter the Euromillions to afford Johnstone)
RE: Grass, greener, other side - 4evaabaggie - 21-03-2023
Salop, I agree with Dingle in so much as he generated the circumstances so he could leave on a free to go to the prem, how many other players have done this at Albion and other clubs. I also agree with Minizin, we were sliding down the pyramid with a T-rex in charge, he was thinking of his career, Palace were established in the top flight, doing well, he got more money, could have been good for his international status but it hasn't worked out. Palace also having a bad season, I don't blame him for moving on no more than I blame Ben for joining Watford when he did. I don't agree with the way agents and players screw clubs over, the same way clubs used to screw players over but that's football.
I honestly feel we would be pushing Burnley rather than hoping to catch Millwall had he stayed. I would take him back, the greed league sucks, it creates these situations, I remember the days of level playing fields. I think we're all on the same page, different paragraphs but the same page.
We all want what's best for the Albion, unlike players / agents we know the grass isn't always greener over the fence. We can't afford him and it will be a struggle to get into the playoffs lottery let alone promoted.
RE: Grass, greener, other side - Blue Baggie - 22-03-2023
He's gone, time to move on. We have 2 fine keepers who are both very capable.
Sadly we will only be selling players from now on, we are in the zero cashflow situation. Until the owner changes were stuck.