long-term contracts for over 30s

[Tarrou]

The club always seemed to be against doing this. I thought the Mata deal might be a bit of a one-off, but we've given Matic a 3 year deal as well

I appreciate what Matic gives us but we don't need to tie him down until he's nearly 35, surely? A rolling one year deal, or at most a two year deal would've been fine

 

[Pexbo]

I think a few reasons.

1. We don’t have that many experienced heads in the squad so it doesn’t hurt to tie down the ones that we have.
2. The ones we have tied down on longer contracts, Matic and Mata are both high football intelligence players who have never relied on pace. They have a lot of knowledge to pass on in a player-coach capacity.
3. That policy is a bit antiquated in itself. Sports science has come a long way in the last two decades, 30 is no longer the threshold that it was.

 

[Ibi Dreams]

I don't mind the Matic deal. Gives us time to find a good replacement, and I think even at 34/35 he'll have something to offer if used smartly. Ideally we'll find a replacement soon and he can bed in gradually and rotate with Matic.

It's not like we're going to get anything by selling him, and if he becomes a liability we just won't really play him. Could be some wasted salary money but I can't really bring myself to care

 

[Aint gota Kalou]

I thought we would go for our normal 1+1 deals. Still it's better than doing an Arsenal and losing experienced valuable players on a free.

 

[Bwuk]

Happy enough for it to be on a case by case basis. Matic will still be a starter next season, probably rotation option the season. Nothing wrong with that.

Fernandinho is still Citys best DM and he’s what 35?

 

[Wednesday at Stoke]

I think it was Fergie era policy that hasn't been enforced as much since his retirement. Even Fergie offered long extensions to players in their late 20s, which is no different from a 3 year extension to a 31 year old.

Carrick was pretty serviceable into his mid 30s and Matic has had fewer reliability issues in his career so he should be able to age well.

 

[lysglimt]

Depends on a lot of things - as mentioned above, Matic and Mata are intelligent players whose contribution to the squad even when not playing - probably is quite big. In addition - wages...paying someone 100 grand a week for 3 years is not a disaster because even if we decide to get rid of him in 1 year, there will be other clubs who would be willing to take him.

The problem was when we paid someone 3 times as much - and that person flopped, there was no way any other clubs could afford to pay the wages

 

[The holy trinity 68]

30 is the new 50. I can’t believe the club are wasting money on geriatrics. Woodward and Ole are turning this club into a retirement home. Am I doing it right?

 

[kkengvib]

Was also surprised with both Mata's and Matic's length of contract.
Given that they've looked like they were on their last legs on multiple occasions I'm not sure if we should be giving them longer contracts.
I would've like the last year to be a club option. I hope the wages scale down in the latter years of the deal to give us some flexibility.

 

[Skills]

3 year contract isn't long term. It's basically saying, you'll be here for 2 years and we'll think about the 3rd year.

 

[Andycoleno9]

I thought we would go for our normal 1+1 deals. Still it's better than doing an Arsenal and losing experienced valuable players on a free.

2 years contract would be the best but we all forget that players also try to protect themselves and have other offers too. I doubt that Matic was without offers. Sure it was not some big club like us but still, he is in a phase when he is signing last contract of his career so players will always want longer contract.

It is risky business because after 30 decline comes fast. In one season you are excellent and in other you are not.

 

[fps]

Think Matic is a different situation to Mata. The former is currently a key first team player, the latter has unfortunately never really had the physicality to play that right wing role, and his legs have certainly not been there for at least 3 seasons now. Matic will be a first-team player next year, the year after we'll see and it's better to keep a player if they are ageing really well than to lose them when in fact they could have played a good squad role for another year.

 

[midnightmare]

The club always seemed to be against doing this. I thought the Mata deal might be a bit of a one-off, but we've given Matic a 3 year deal as well

I appreciate what Matic gives us but we don't need to tie him down until he's nearly 35, surely? A rolling one year deal, or at most a two year deal would've been fine

Feel it's fine, personally. For the most part, the players Fergie handled at that age were the Co92 + Keane and they were pretty much never going to leave. Not with Fergie helming things. It's different now. Players stay fitter till later in their careers and we are not the serial winning machine of yore that players would never contemplate leaving. Herrera leaving left us needing to fill a squad place. Pointless to risk Matic doing the same at an age when he'd be a great squad member to have to play perhaps once in a week while guiding and mentoring youngsters stepping into that midfield (Garner, Levitt, others).

 

[Thepinhead]

Also Matic plays a position you can play at a high level long into your 30's. You see a lot of offensive midfielders move to a more defensive role later on in their career because that position is more about footballing brain than the physical aspects. So I wouldn't be surprised if we see some of the best football from Matic the next few years.

 

[baskinginthesun]

Players are quite capable these days to play into their mid-30's. Offering 2 or 3 year deals after your 30 is fine. I'm sure they analysed all sorts of athletic data regarding Matic and fitness projections to come to the conclusion that he'll be fine for the duration of the deal.

The other part of it is that we really don't know the details of the contract. They get more complicated as the years roll on. I wouldn't be surprised to see all sorts of options available to both club and player in the 3rd year if things go wrong or it's not panning out like everyone planned.

 

[Tiber]

After long-term mediocrity, Matic has finally found some form. This is commendable and he deserved some more time at the club based on this. But a 3 year contract for a midfielder who is 31 and has long standing issues with pace feels much more strange than giving someone like Mata a long term role coming off the bench.

We should be signing a long term replacement for Matic in the window which opens in a few weeks, not in 2-3 years.

 

[spiriticon]

Not sure about the 3 year contract either.

At 34 he's not going to be contributing much but we're still going to be paying him presumably feck loads.

 

[Gopher Brown]

30 is the new 50. I can’t believe the club are wasting money on geriatrics. Woodward and Ole are turning this club into a retirement home. Am I doing it right?

Yeah, you're doing it right, I'm glad Gomes isn't signing. He'll never improve at his age.

 

[Eire Red United]

Also Matic plays a position you can play at a high level long into your 30's. You see a lot of offensive midfielders move to a more defensive role later on in their career because that position is more about footballing brain than the physical aspects. So I wouldn't be surprised if we see some of the best football from Matic the next few years.

Agreed. Look at Carrick, played some of his best football for us well into his 30’s and unlike Carrick, Matic will have the quality and energy of Pogba, Fred, McT and Bruno to share the work load.

 

[Rood]

is it fixed 3 years? surely its a 2+1 yr deal -

no big deal either way - they might even be lined up as future coaches

 

[cyril C]

Put yourself in Matic (or Mata or Young or anyone near 30 years old) shoe, you want a longish deal to secure your future. That's why we give a longish extension when players are near 28-29, roll it into their 33-34 years old, thereafter 1 year rolling extension. 99% top players actually play on their top form (Rooney & Owen exception) at 30, except for drop in physical capability and injury recovery time.

My concern is hopefully Matic doesn't do a Rooney or DDG on us and starts "relaxing" after a new contract. If he can produce the kind of form in last month for the next 2-3 seasons, even at 20-25 games a season, is still a good deal to us.

 

[Escobar]

I think a few reasons.

1. We don’t have that many experienced heads in the squad so it doesn’t hurt to tie down the ones that we have.
2. The ones we have tied down on longer contracts, Matic and Mata are both high football intelligence players who have never relied on pace. They have a lot of knowledge to pass on in a player-coach capacity.
3. That policy is a bit antiquated in itself. Sports science has come a long way in the last two decades, 30 is no longer the threshold that it was.

I agree with your points and in case it doesn’t work out, we can still sell him like we did with other players. I just think we need to be sensible with the salary

 

[UpWithRivers]

Id rather a strategy of selling before they are worthless. I think Mourinho would chew his fingers off to get Matic. 30/35 mill easy. Then we should get someone like Ndidi for 70. Something like that. Yeah its hard to say lets get rid of Matic. I like the guy and he is key at the moment but sometimes you need to make crucial long term decisions

 

[cyril C]

Id rather a strategy of selling before they are worthless. I think Mourinho would chew his fingers off to get Matic. 30/35 mill easy. Then we should get someone like Ndidi for 70. Something like that. Yeah its hard to say lets get rid of Matic. I like the guy and he is key at the moment but sometimes you need to make crucial long term decisions

30m easy? 6 months ago might still be possible, nowadays which club is capable of 30m cash? Most will come in with a swap offer...

 

[Isotope]

I don't see the problem with extending Matic's. As most have been saying, he's still very useful during that contract. It was extending contract for the like of Jones, Rojo, and Mata I disagreed strongly. It reeks the Club is protecting "assets".

 

[iluvoursolskjær]

I'd have preferred a 2 year, but he is an experienced head in a position we don't even have one other semi-adequate body for at this moment.

 

[Tarrou]

I don't see the problem with extending Matic's. As most have been saying, he's still very useful during that contract. It was extending contract for the like of Jones, Rojo, and Mata I disagreed strongly. It reeks the Club is protecting "assets".

I think everyone is happy we extended Matic, but why 3 years? 2 Years achieves the same result and possibly one year does too.

We've struggled to get rid of dead-wood in recent years because players are being paid more than they are worth. In a year if Matic's form goes off a cliff we'll be in the same spot again.

 

[Isotope]

I think everyone is happy we extended Matic, but why 3 years? 2 Years achieves the same result and possibly one year does too.

We've struggled to get rid of dead-wood in recent years because players are being paid more than they are worth. In a year if Matic's form goes off a cliff we'll be in the same spot again.

Mostly because he wouldn't agree with 1 year contract. And it seems like it's 2+1 year ext. contract.

 

[Web of Bissaka]

It's 3 year contract

Not 2 (+1)

 

[Tarrou]

Mostly because he wouldn't agree with 1 year contract. And it seems like it's 2+1 year ext. contract.

He didn't need to agree anything though, we activated his extension to 2021

 

[Red_toad]

I'd have preferred a 2 year, but he is an experienced head in a position we don't even have one other semi-adequate body for at this moment.

Maybe he didn’t prefer 2 years and had other options. Pretty sure he’ll still be able to produce good performances for then next 3 years, we just can’t play him every single game. So we get a player who’ll rotate and allow others to gain more experience. Which is preferable to relying on McTommy & Fred as our only 2 options. Or needing to spend big money on replacing him, so we don’t solve the right wing option...

 

[Isotope]

He didn't need to agree anything though, we activated his extension to 2021

Then he'll be a free agent.

 

[hmchan]

Think Matic is a different situation to Mata. The former is currently a key first team player, the latter has unfortunately never really had the physicality to play that right wing role, and his legs have certainly not been there for at least 3 seasons now. Matic will be a first-team player next year, the year after we'll see and it's better to keep a player if they are ageing really well than to lose them when in fact they could have played a good squad role for another year.

A bit off topic but I don't understand why so many still believe this myth. Mata started his senior career at Valencia playing on the wing, and he enjoyed one of his best forms in his life at Chelsea in the right wing role. The reason he struggles with us is due to the lack of movement and cohesion around him, which he heavily relies on. It is irrelevant to his position.

 

[devilish]

United's main problem is that they simply can't handle a high staff turnover. Thus we're forced to keep players for a longer time then we want. Woodward said that himself.

 

[Ciddy]

The science behind the game is being used more than ever, and players are playing well into their 30's more often. Specifically for Matic, I don't think in anyway it'll mean he'll be first choice for the next 3 years. What it does do though is give us options to use him sparingly, prolonging him. It'll also mean he's around to help blood the like s of Scotty and Garner perhaps with view to slotting one of them into his role, rather than spending the crazy money players seem to be costing these days (especially If you think you have replacements already at the club that just need a few more years).

 

[fps]

A bit off topic but I don't understand why so many still believe this myth. Mata started his senior career at Valencia playing on the wing, and he enjoyed one of his best forms in his life at Chelsea in the right wing role. The reason he struggles with us is due to the lack of movement and cohesion around him, which he heavily relies on. It is irrelevant to his position.

It may be true he lacked quality around him and struggled as a result, that’s fair. But in terms of mobility and what the PL requires in sheer athleticism and how the game has changed to demand pressing from the front he’s always felt like a protractor when you need a wind-up toy out there. Or something, it’s early.

 

[11101]

I think a few reasons.

1. We don’t have that many experienced heads in the squad so it doesn’t hurt to tie down the ones that we have.
2. The ones we have tied down on longer contracts, Matic and Mata are both high football intelligence players who have never relied on pace. They have a lot of knowledge to pass on in a player-coach capacity.
3. That policy is a bit antiquated in itself. Sports science has come a long way in the last two decades, 30 is no longer the threshold that it was.

I don't think the first two have much to do with it. Mata has been a bit of a liability for a year or two. I think we offered him that deal because at the time we had little choice. We were struggling for creativity and he can offer that.

Matic is a bit the same. 30 is not the cut off it once was and players hold far more power than they did, he had the negotiating power as we haven't found a replacement for him yet. He knows we need him.

2+1 contracts fit modern sports science better anyway. We should know if a 30 year old will have issues in the next couple of years. Go back to 1+1 from 33+.

 

[Annihilate Now!]

People need to stop this thinking that 30 year old means you're suddenly completely useless.

People also need to stop thinking that giving people 2/3 years means this person will 100% definitely be at the club for all those 3 years... We can still sell players you know (hell... we literally just got £1.5m for Ashley Young this season)

 

[dalriada]

The accepted policy in the recent past was that the club only gave a year at a time, with a +1 option, to players over thirty, although there was a bit of flex in that. The club was maybe too rigid sometimes with that, and I can see why, when you're in a rebuilding phase, you look for certainty for some players, whereas with settled teams under a long-serving manager like SAF you can afford to manage it year by year.

I always have the view that contracts are anyway a matter between the employer and the employee. I know it's football and it's "our club" in a way that's different to other businesses, but it's up to the owners how long they are, and never sure why some people get so worked up about it.

 

[Mr Smith]

Oh stop whinging. Matic has been great and is our most experienced player. Securing his future for the next few years is a good move.