Possible Explanation:
Now is not the right time to sign him.
In a perfect world, we would want the club to keep Cork,
Ward-Prose, Davis, Schneiderlin, and Wanyama.
Davis just signed a new contract.
Ward-Prose signed a long term contract last year, but we have seen how
ineffective such contracts are at retaining young players against their will. The club might be planning to sign all of the
midfielders to new contracts. If so,
they will want to sign them in the right order.
If they were to sign Cork, his new salary would act as a floor for the
salaries that would be expected by Wanyama, Schneiderlin, and possibly
Ward-Prose. If so, it would make sense
to put off signing Cork until one of the others was signed—after all the
Wanyama and Schneiderlin salaries would act as a ceiling on what Cork could
expect.
Possible Explanation:
Financial Fair Play (FFP) Issues
The club might want to make sure signing Cork fits within its
FFP limitations before resigning him.
At this point the club cannot rule out qualifying for Europe
for the 2015-2016 and 2016-2017 seasons. As a precaution, the club will want to
avoid any FFP issues. The club lost £11.942 million in 2011-2012 and £6.551
million in 2012-2013. The figures for
2013-2014 are not in yet, but very likely the club made another loss. Given the high level of transfer spending
last year, let’s just pretend the club lost £20 million. That would make the three year loses over £38
million. At today’s conversion rates,
that is over 48 million Euros. The
allowable loss for that three year period is only 45 million Euros. Some expenses—particularly, the costs of the
academy—do not count so we are well under the limit unless my guess as to the
amount of the loss is wrong. If we
actually lost £40 million last year there is a real problem, so the club would want to show progress to UEFA by being able to say, in good faith, that there would be a profit in 2014-2015. Moreover, any loss
over 5 million Euros must be funded by Owner contributions. Liebherr did put in nearly £38 million in
fiscal 2012-2013 so we are probably good on that. This probably means we should be ok if we
qualify for Europe for this season.
However, the FFP
limit for 2016-2017 qualification is only a loss of 30 million Euros for
the three season beginning with 2012-2013.
Given my earlier guess, we are at losses of 26 million Euros before
2014-2015 is considered. Right now, we
have a transfer profit large enough to make EUFA FFP completely
irrelevant. However, that could change
if the club needs or wants to make significant January signings or if several
players are signed to new, more lucrative contracts. The club may have to hold off on signing Cork
until it has a clear idea where it stands with respect to FFP issues. Possibly, if enough other players are signed
to new contracts, we cannot afford Cork.
Possible
Explanation: Salary Cap Issues
I have already
discussed the salary cap at great length on multiple occasions, so I will not
repeat that discussion here. I currently
do not believe that Southampton faces significant salary cap issues but I could
be wrong. If so, they would want to put
off increasing Cork’s salary as long as possible.
Even if there are
no current salary cap issues, the club might want to save its salary cap
maneuvering room for other players. Clyne
will be expensive to re-sign. The club
might be considering exercising its options on Bertrand or Alderweireld in
January. Certainly, Alderweireld would
get a pay raise if that happens. New
contracts for Clyne, Schneiderlin, Rodriguez, and Alderweireld could eat up
millions of pounds of salary cap space.
The club might not want to commit to Cork until it knows whether it
needs the cap space for other players.
Possible
Explanation: Cash Flow
We all assume the
club has plenty of money right now, but it might not. What if we sold Luke Shaw for £6 million a
year for five years, but bought Shane Long for £12 in cash? What if the deal for Lallana involved saving
a little money in the long run by giving Bournemouth its money up front? These are just examples, of course, not facts
I am asserting are true. However, we do
know that there were substantial fees due this year from past transfers and Staplewood cost a lot of money.
A cash flow problem is not at all
unlikely. If Cork were signed to a new
contract, any signing bonus, agent fees, and increased salary would have to be
paid in cash. Possibly the board does
not want to commit to this expense earlier than it has to. Maybe it is waiting for the arrival of the next
payment of Shaw money from Manchester United.
Possible Explanation:
He is not a good enough player.
Both of our last two managers have clearly not seen him as
first choice. Pochettino preferred Schneiderlin, Davis, Wanyama, and possibly, Ward-Prose. Koeman prefers Schneiderlin, Davis,
Ward-Prose, and possible Wanyama.
Cork seems to play well when he gets into the game and is
getting a run of starts now, but I would never put my judgment of his skills up
against that of the club’s manager. If
Cork were to leave, we would need a squad player to act as cover in the central
midfield. Whomever we got to replace him
would probably be more expensive or not as good or both so I still think it
would make sense to sign him, but possibly the club has already identified a
good, but cheaper, transfer target to replace him.
As I hope I made
clear, I do not have any actual information about any of this, but I hope I
have also made clear that there can be perfectly good reasons why the club is
not immediately signing Jack Cork to a new contract.
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