Stating the Villa Obvious on the Carney Chukwuemeka Situation
Lets start with two facts…
Despite what certain headlines suggest no team will buy Carney Chukwuemeka for a transfer fee of £20m (or even half of that) this summer and no team will pay Carney Chukwuemeka £100,000-a-week for his next contract.
At the end of last year, Aston Villa offered Chukwuemeka a new deal, as he only had one-year of his contract to run. The player to this date has snubbed it.
Now, if Villa rated the 18-year-old player, and you’d guess they did, since they were drip feeding him into the first team last season, the financial package for his age would be decent. Indeed, after a period of negotiation, the final price that Villa arrived at would have potentially been more than they originally wanted to offer the midfielder, who made two starts last season, with 10 further appearances from the bench.
Groundhog Day Demand
The Chukwuemeka scenario actually hasn’t changed much from eight months ago, and the continued press coverage has been constantly repetitive.
Desperately repetitive, it has to be said…as if it was being orchestrated by a third party.
Notice the ever-growing mentions of links to Europe’s top teams. The likes of Barcelona, Borussia Dortmund, Bayern Munich, Paris St Germain, Liverpool, Manchester United and Arsenal, have all made good attention-grabbing clickbait.
If Chukwuemeka’s team/agent have been feeding such names to the kind of low brow football media that will print anything (you know who I’m talking about), the reality is since Villa drew their line in the sand, seven-plus months ago, no team seems to have come in during this time to get ahead of this supposed feverish demand.
The truth of the matter is, if any of these aforementioned teams have ANY interest in the player, it’s probably only on the off chance they can sign him on a pre-contract for the 2023/24 season, as a free agent (where they’ll pay a minimal compensation fee).
False Narrative
The attempts to build a narrative to cover up a greedy player (or the greedy management team of the player), who’s attitude on face value, puts him in danger of being seen as something of a Poundland Pogba, are quite frankly laughable.
As a Guardian writer wrote last November:
‘He has come to fear that the club will most likely rely on established players or signings at the expense of promoting youngsters.’
Two words: Jacob Ramsay.
Ramsay made his Villa first team debut 17-years-old and went on to sign a new four-and-a-half-year contract with the club, aged 19-years-old. Last season, he really came into his own, making 34 Premier League appearances and scoring six goals.
Would Chukwuemeka really have a better chance of playing more first team games at any of the teams he’s allegedly linked to? You know, the teams that finished higher than Villa last season or are chasing the Champions League next season?
Chukwuemeka has actually had more first team experience at 18 for Villa, than Ramsay did, so he can’t cry in terms of opportunity.
Those journalists prone to hyperbole, like touting Chukwuemeka around as a one of the best future central midfield players in Europe, obviously haven’t watched many of his Villa first team performances. Based solely on them, from MOMS point of view, it’s easy come, easy go, when it comes to his future.
The next couple of seasons, would be more key to truly building up a better picture of the player’s true potential and any team would be taking on something of a gamble on a player of his age, at this stage of his career.
Silly headlines like ‘Aston Villa set to lose millions as Carney Chukwuemeka refuses new deal’ from the Daily Telegraph and ‘Sources: Aston Villa sensation Carney Chukwuemeka wants extraordinary £100,000-a-week deal’ from the cringeworthy Football Insider, simply create a clickbait pantomime that its orchestrators and the player will eventually regret.
Judging by Steven Gerrard leaving the player behind when Villa went on their Australian preseason tour, the club have already had enough of it, and so has MOMS.
UTV
As a temporary contract worker, I ask for as much money as I think I am worth to a prospective employer. If they agree, I sign the contract and work for x amount of time at y rate. Am even in a better situation than a footballer, can work till I die and no one is tackling me every three days or so. Depending on how much I want to work with them does affect my price.
Told my last employer there was nothing they could offer me to stay. Mr. Chukweumeka hasn’t done that. Shows Character IMO.
I think the whole saga, brings in to question his Character.
Whether thats being driven by his representatives or him, I am not privvy to….but it doesn’t sit well with most people.
If his character is in fact flawed, that will inevitably impact of his football.
until we know for sure, the real reason why he won’t sign, we will all continue to speculate.
Last season, I was happy with a player looking OK. Mostly they didn’t. Pretty much everyone underperformed.
Carney may or may not turn out to be a great player, given the comments by Purslow about him when he was 16 it is expected he will. Didn’t do too shabby in the Euros recently, given more run out than as the 80th min sub in a losing game though.
For me it’s not the one player that is worrying it’s the continual catalogue of errors in managing this situation and again a player does not believe Villa can match their ambition. 100k a week is a joke ask, highly unlikely to be met so in effect is a statement that he doesn’t want to play for Villa anymore. 20mm price tag is an attempt to make another club look more foolish than Villa for allowing this situation to happen.
What’s one year on a bench to an 18 yr old, goto Barca for 300k next summer. Play well in their B team, he could be in the Champions League by the age of 20. Be a bet I would make before betting on Villa being there by that time.
All this leaves Villa hoping Carney’s brother is the better of the two. Good work fellas.
A good prospect for the future, that’s about it, not worth all the fuss and nonsense. If he doesn’t want to sign a new Villa contract just let him sit on the bench for the next 12 months, and as for £100 k a week this kids in dreamland.
Took part in 10 first team games last season and looked ok but nothing outstanding. Personally I would let him go and just forget it.