KopTalk.com Forums Football Liverpool FC Forum Martin Jol on Clint Dempsey

"Martin Jol: I loved Dempsey like a son
The Fulham boss has expressed his disappointment at losing the American midfielder over the summer, believing that his main motive for leaving the club was extra cash"


I've just been reading the weekend papers and Jol's comments about Dempsey might enlighten some people to a possibility that it was not just the transfer fee that was a potential issue.

Dempsey wouldn't have been doing much in our system anyway and has hardly set Tottenham on fire, but some people had their pitch forks out on the owners.

Brendan Rodgers refused to agree the Sigurdsson transfer due to the wage demands, and it could be quite possible that Dempsey also wanted top dollar on the back of the season he had. The 4 or 5 million we offered might have been a deal to subsidise his wage demands.

At the end of the day, our problems wouldn't have made a difference had he signed. He would have only been a replacement for an injured Gerrard and by the time he replaced him he would be in the same situation and need a replacement.

he probably wuld have been up front against west ham this weekend but then again, you're right in saying that overall he wasn't the man we needed

still in need of more options but i'm happy with the way this has all turned out now. we've had to blood the younger players, majority of them have been brilliant at such an early stage of their careers. might not have got the chance had dempsey of signed for us. still think we'd have made the transfer fee back from shirt sales in the states though

the issue isn't whether he would have been good enough or not. the issue is the owners overruled the manager. reciepe for disaster that, but then again these owners have yet to get anything right.

my own opinion is he would have been very very good for us and would have been an ever-present.

I used to think that too... but how I wish that they'd overruled Kenny and Comolli.

It's surprising that they didn't think Dempsey (23 goals last season) was worth £6m but they were happy to £70m+ for downing, carroll and henderson.....who managed 6 goals between the 3 of them.

The point being made was about the wage demands.
Nobody knows that the deal was blocked, it is just rumour created from the transpired events.
Rodgers expected the deal to be done but it fell apart. It could have been Dempsey's wage demands rather than the transfer fee, as was the case with Sigurdsson.
Maybe he wanted a 5 year contract and we would only offer 3.

The hate towards the owners not releasing an extra mill or two, is not justified (as we don't know what the truth is) and that is the point I was trying to make.

we do know tho. after the siggy deal BR came out and said why. he was clearly angry over the dempsey thing and he(clint) went for the fee that was expected anyway. If it was a wage thing BR would have been first to say so. And FSG came out and said it was due to them thinking he was an expensive midtable player. Don't br rewritting history to suit fsg - they are thick and need removing

it's not as if either of them has lit the league up though.

I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt until the end of this January window at least before we get a really clear picture of them.

It certainly appeared that Dempsey's transfer was blocked by FSG but hopefully they will have learned their lesson and how threadbare their actions left the squad and will stay removed from transfer dealings from now on