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Football moves fast these days. An out of favour player can quickly become a hero by virtue of a winning goal. Nevertheless, it is difficult to remember opinions of a player changing so dramatically than they have done with Dimitri Payet.
It is not just fans that have been quick to criticise Payet. Andy Carroll and Karren Brady were not particularly subtle in comments they made following the Hammers 3-0 victory of Crystal Palace yesterday.
Payet’s behaviour in refusing to play is inexcusable, but is not surprising. It is easy to criticise someone that is reportedly earning £125,000 a week but football is unlike other jobs not just because of the salaries paid to players. Payet cannot simply hand in his resignation, work two games notice and then leave of his own accord. Players can of course ask their agents to find them a new team but they are still at the mercy of their own club. The only way players can force a move through is to make it abundantly clear that they do not want to be there and this surely is not a rare occurrence.
The seeds of this were sown a year ago, when Payet signed a new contract just six months after joining West Ham. The Frenchman still had four-and-a-half years left on his original deal when he signed a new five-and-a-half-year contract. This is a contract that I do not think Payet nor the West Ham board believed would be honoured. This deal was put in place in order to maximise the amount of money the club would gain when they had to sell him.
You cannot blame Payet for signing it, very few people would pass up an opportunity of a five-and-a-half-year contract because they feel they might not want to be at a club for that long. Had Payet picked up a year long injury just after signing that deal then things could have turned out very differently. He would have missed the Euros and could even have struggled to win his place back in the West Ham team had he struggled to regain his form and the fortunes of Andre Ayew and Sofiane Feghouli also been different. That may be slightly fanciful but the careers of footballers are short and unpredictable. Long-term contracts provide security from worst-case scenarios.
That is not to say Payet is too good for West Ham, although when he signed that new contract last year David Sullivan did declare him the best player he’d signed in 25 years. With the money and facilities they now possess the Hammers should be capable of signing and holding on to players of Payet’s calibre. However, it is difficult to see how anything good can come of playing someone that does not want to be there and I’m sure the owners know that. Whilst stating they will not sell Payet they are probably already planning how to spend the money they will receive for his transfer, right now Payet is as valuable as he is ever likely to be after all. A goal scorer should be top of their list and if they can find one they could easily finish this season in seventh place.
Both parties need to move on, and that includes West Ham fans. Remember the song and his free kicks and without defending his more recent actions, understand that he is not the first nor will not be the last to use them to engineer a move. It surely goes on more than we realise.
