anger and I hope we take the hardest line possible and Beckford gets nothing from us.
.........
But he will,he just has to sit on his £40k per week(most people would do the same)never ever worth any thing like that.warnock said his agent contacted him 6 times during last season trying to get beckford loan move to leeds saying he could do a deal with Leicester so leeds would only have to pay £10 k per week but warnock was not interested.never been same player since he left leeds.think you are stuck with him for next few yrs.

We don't know all the story but I find it hard to find any sympathy for Beckford.
Beckford and Nugent should have been a great strike force but Beckford fell short.

Leave him to rot in a field away from the club so that he does not taint any part of the team..

Yeah, this could be a load of made up rubbish. But it stinks enough of Beckford to have some semblance of truth.

An amazing salary and first team football less luring than an obscene salary and no football? If Beckford chooses the latter, he deserves no respect from anyone.

I'm not sure I believe this. Yes, I had been wondering why it had all gone quiet, but this story is the complete opposite of what was coming out of Bolton (and the LM) last week. The it was reported that the two clubs had agreed a deal, that JB had undergone a medical and all that remained was to agree personal terms. That line of reporting developed into terms having been agreed and that Bolton were dotting i's and crossing t's.

So, one of these two stories (sadly if not both) has been completely made up.

Was it not the same source who previously reported that Pearson had already been sacked and later that City were in for Demba Ba?

This article just doesn't make sense.

Surely Leicester approach would be - you are under contract so if you are going, put in a transfer request - at which point, your wages are no longer our problem.

Alternatively, if you want to go on a free - we mutually agree to cancel your contract and owe you nothing.

Going on a free and having your contract bought out - not a chance. There is nothing in City's corporate structure that refers to them being a registered charity !!

I agree Prawn, but I suppose the fall back position for Beckford is to see out his 2 years left with Leicester on £30,000 a week, or whatever he is on, and just watch from the sidelines. Then he can leave on a Bosman and trouser a nice signing on fee from somewhere else whilst claiming he was frozen out by Pearson.

To be fair to Beckford (and I know none of us really want to be that) why would he want to give up £1.5m a year if Bolton are only offering a fraction of that? To play football yes, but it is a huge amount of money to give up.

And City are the ones who gave him the contract, is it not a little unfair to slag off Beckford because City want to break that contract?

Personally, and I know I am in the minority here, if we cannot sell him on and get all his wages off the books I think we should swallow our pride and and get him back in the squad. He does have qualities that I think would benefit the team this season, even if those are only used from the bench.

If we're going to do that, we might as well send him out on a long-term loan to them and guarantee that he can't play against us.

As previously commented on earlier, please can people bare in mind that the alleged 'source' for this piece is Sports News Direct. The same alleged 'source' that said we wanted Demba Ba on loan. They are at best charlatans.

But if it is true, then I say good on Beckford. He left a comfortable contract at a top 7 Premier League club to join, what was then, an ambitious club with big plans and to play for an internationally recognised manager. Within 6 weeks, the manager is sacked and then his replacement takes a pathological hatred towards him, implies that he is to blame for all of the club's ineptitudes, breaks up what looked to be a very good partnership with David Nugent, gives him 6 games of the next season and then promptly offloads him to Huddersfield. I don't blame Jermaine for trying to get back the money he is rightfully owned - if you sign a contract for 3 and a half years, you sign it in good faith and with the realistic expectation that the figure quoted in the contract will be the figure you get at the end of it. Beckford has not done anything wrong, he hasn't commited a misconduct offence, he's not asked for a transfer, he's just a player who's a bit too high profile and high calibre for Nigel Pearson. That's not his fault, if Pearson can't see his qualities then maybe you should blame him.

And before the cries of 'he's bleeding us dry!!!' come in, just ask yourself - would you give up two years of your contract? A contract you signed in good faith? A contract you intended to see out, and would have if it wasn't for your total dinosaur of a manager?

If anything, I'd say in the real world Beckford could have also tried to go for constructive dismissal. The club should just pay the guy what he's entitled to and let him get on with his career, and let him get on with helping a club achieve promotion next season. If that bankrupts the club, or pushes us further into the FFP abyss, so be it - the club has been mismanaged by the owners and by it's management team, not an individual footballer.

"Beckford and Nugent should have been a great strike force but Beckford fell short."

Wrong. Beckford and Nugent were beginning to form a formidable partnership with Nugent in the third quarter of the 2011-2012 season, until Pearson broke it up and played Nugent on the right wing with Beckford up front on his own with very little support. If you want to blame anyone, blame Pearson, and while you're at it ask him why he made such a foolish decision in the first place.

"Within 6 weeks, the manager is sacked and then his replacement takes a pathological hatred towards him, implies that he is to blame for all of the club's ineptitudes..."

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I must have missed that media statement.

Anyway, you're quite right when you say that Beckford is acting within the terms of his contract. If your contract allows you to essentially become a leech, then that remains a legal option to you. I suppose he isn't constantly bleating in the press about how hard done to he is or somehow trying to claim the moral high ground like DJ Campbell did.
("Don't get in the way of my dream move to Blackpool!"

So I wouldn't accuse him of wrongdoing or hold any particular grudge. I just want him to leave for the benefit of Leicester City FC and where they stand right now, so they don't have to pay precious wage money to him any longer and don't have to fork out who-knows-what in additional payments to Everton if he plays another game. (As is rumoured.)

Also, you correctly point out that he's not acting dishonourably in what he's doing. I agree, although the reverse is also true - neither is he acting honourably. Instead, he seems to have taken the stock view that sitting back and taking the money is more important to him that getting a clean break and getting on with his career. That tells you all you need to know about how hard he's willing to work, for Leicester or anybody else, and it's personality trait that Pearson has a history of weeding out of his squads. It's nothing to do with a good or bad manager who can't motivate him. The responsibility for Beckford and his career lies primarily at the player's door.

To be fair FFS and Foxello, I agree with you. If I had been told that I wasn't wanted by my employer, my attitude would be to request that the contract I signed should be honoured and then I would leave. If they refused to pay, I would take legal action.

There will always be supporters who turn against anyone who does not tow the party line. So whatever Beckford does from now onwards, some will hate him.

If any of this article is true (and I suspect most of it isn't) the villains of the piece would appear to be Bolton. Yes, we want him but No, we are not prepared to pay for him.

The compromise would surely be that we value him at £3m, they give us £1.5m (and the player a signing on bonus of £1.5m) and Beckford agrees to walk away from his contract with Leicester. Failing that, Bolton can look elsewhere.

We should the either use him (in a fast dimishing squad) and persuade him that his best chance of a move is to play well. Or send him out on loan and get the recipient to pay a portion of his wages.

Good debate.

Dungeon very eloquently makes my arguments but I understand that Beckford is quite legally allowed to try and get what he is owed from his ludicrously over paid silly contract given to him by our club under the stewardship of Sven and our over eager owners.

But, if he choses to stay, and leech off the club rather than leave for a merge salary of £15k per week (boo hoo) then as a fan of our club I'll have zero respect for him. And like DJ Campbell, I will boo him and take pleasure in his average to poor performances against us.

Bitter? Oh yes.

I guess you were equally as outraged by the way sven treated the likes of fryatt, hobbs, Morrison, weale and berner

'
Also, you correctly point out that he's not acting dishonourably in what he's doing. I agree, although the reverse is also true - neither is he acting honourably. Instead, he seems to have taken the stock view that sitting back and taking the money is more important to him that getting a clean break and getting on with his career. That tells you all you need to know about how hard he's willing to work, for Leicester or anybody else, and it's personality trait that Pearson has a history of weeding out of his squads. It's nothing to do with a good or bad manager who can't motivate him. The responsibility for Beckford and his career lies primarily at the player's door.'

This is the crux of it for me. He may be entitled to hold out for his money but the other side of it is we are entitled to leave him out the team. If we decide to do this and he's happy to stay (he can't seriously think he's going to be a first team here player anyway) then that tells you what you need to know about him.

I don't sympathise with the player just because he's technically owed money. He's been stealing a living since he's been here and has got more money than he's deserved. If he cares about doing his job well like a professional person he'll leave even if he has to take a paycut.

" Within 6 weeks, the manager is sacked and then his replacement takes a pathological hatred towards him, implies that he is to blame for all of the club's ineptitudes, breaks up what looked to be a very good partnership with David Nugent, gives him 6 games of the next season and then promptly offloads him to Huddersfield"

GARBAGE!

As a Leeds fan, I am familiar with JB.

Question for those of you who have slagged him off as not being professional - do you know whether he has showed up for training on time, worked hard, done all that has been asked of him, or not?

If he has done all that was asked of him, hard to attack his professionalism.

Expecting the club to honour his contract is what one would expect of a professional, isn't it?

JB is a confidence player who needs to be treated in a certain way. A manager with good people skills would find a way to get the most out of him. Mind you, not the easiest task in the world.

'do you know whether he has showed up for training on time, worked hard, done all that has been asked of him, or not?'

I know that Pearson has suggested he's not been willing to work hard in training, and I know his effort has been lacking on the pitch at times.

'Expecting the club to honour his contract is what one would expect of a professional, isn't it?'

If he honours it, yes. meaning if he does his best for the team until it runs out. Why should we be expected to pay his wages when he's going off to play for Bolton before his contract runs out?

He's got a choice here. He can play football for less (though still loads) money. Or he can keep getting his money and not play football until the contract runs out.

I know what I'd do, but I'm not a greedy footballer who's lost all perspective of the real world and the desire they once had to play the sport they loved.

If it's true that his next game for us triggers a £1m payment to Everton, then it's too big a gamble playing him.

"Expecting the club to honour his contract is what one would expect of a professional, isn't it?"

--------

It's a bit of an argument over semantics, this. Is professionalism just turning up and doing what's necessary or is it striving for more? Because in only one of those ways is Beckford acting professionally.

"I agree with you. If I had been told that I wasn't wanted by my employer, my attitude would be to request that the contract I signed should be honoured and then I would leave. If they refused to pay, I would take legal action."

Absolutely correct I'm amazed, but not surprised, at how many people think you can just ride roughshod over a professional, legally binding contract, signed in good faith by all parties.

I'll be interested to know if all those who oppose Beckford being given a pay off will be so unequivocally against the premise of a person being paid what they're entitled to if/when Nigel Pearson is eventually sacked? The strong indication online is that NP would have been sacked had it not for the pay off he would have been entitled to. In effect, the contractual obligation owed to Pearson by the club is the only thing that saved him from being sacked. How many of you opposing Beckford's pay off also oppose a potential Pearson pay off?

And I still can't quite believe that people on here would willfully give up two years of their contract if push came to shove. "Nah it's alright boss, even though you hate my guts, I'm not bothered about that two year salary you owe me, just put it towards your Christmas party." Yeah right

Nobody has suggested that anyone can ride roughshod over a legally binding contract, Foxello. If you believe we've been writing that, you haven't been reading it.

Nobody is saying that you should be able to, for instance, cancel Beckford's contract and just get on with things; we have laws in place to prevent that and it's good that we do.

It should be plain by now that Beckford is never going to play well for us, whoever the manager is. It simply will not happen. Maybe he might have done once, that's open for debate, but from where we are now - impossible. He's too old and advanced in his career to change his personality now and his relationship with the fans will only ever be strained, particularly since some sections chanted against him when we played Huddersfield. Whether you agree with the way things have gone is irrelevant; this is where we are now and you can't change the past.

Given where we are now, what's good for Leicester City is that he goes and leaves the wage bill. Now, as I said, he is entitled to see out his contract to its terms and nobody is suggesting otherwise. But we certainly don't have to like it and if it's not in our interests to either play him or sell him and still pay half his wages (!) then we have no obligation to do that either.

In answer to the question "why should he go" and the misleading analogy about the Christmas party, he should go for his own benefit, so that he can progress his career and play while he's still young enough to do it, to achieve things in his career, because he's ambitious rather than just content with the money and nothing else. Of course he's entitled to stay and take all the money he can - that's our fault for giving him the contract in the first place after all. I don't understand why people like you support him in that and still want this evidently unambitious, low-effort guy to represent us. Even with your dislike of Pearson, I don't get why you can't just dislike both of them!

In short, if he wants to stay to fund his current lifestyle, whatever that may be, then that's his choice. But he'll never receive that kind of money again when his contract's finally up and I don't see why any fan of Leicester City (which we all are here) can respect him as a footballer for that choice. As such, I will go on hoping, for my club's sake, that he leaves and leaves soon.

Comparisons to standard career contracts are futile. Who here has a 3 year contract in place? Who earns £15k a week?

Sadly for me, my company can make me redundant tomorrow and I'd enjoy 3 months salary at best.

Do don't compare things to the standard joe. Beckford is a very rich man due to his obscene salary. He can chose to stay, or he can chose to take a pay cut and play football. On that premise alone, I can't possibly understand how anyone could sympathise with his plight.

Poor man.

* choose. Damn phone.

I asked:

'do you know whether he has showed up for training on time, worked hard, done all that has been asked of him, or not?'

Emilio_Heskeynho answered:

"I know that Pearson has suggested he's not been willing to work hard in training," If that bad, he would be fined. "and I know his effort has been lacking on the pitch at times." That is JB - I am confident more than one Leeds fan would have told you about his personality in the early days of him joining your club.
____________________________________________

Foxello - 606 lives on wrote:

"And I still can't quite believe that people on here would willfully give up two years of their contract if push came to shove."

Exactly, none of us would!
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The_Dungeon_Master (U4830) wrote:

"It should be plain by now that Beckford is never going to play well for us, whoever the manager is. It simply will not happen. Maybe he might have done once, that's open for debate, but from where we are now - impossible. He's too old and advanced in his career to change his personality now"

I am confident more than one Leeds fan would have told you about his personality in the early days of him joining your club.

_______________________________________________

Merseysidefox wrote:

"Do don't compare things to the standard joe. Beckford is a very rich man due to his obscene salary."

Enough to sustain him until he dies? The length of time a footballer can make a living purely from playing football is a lot shorter than the "standard joe." Just as firefighters cannot do their work until their 60s or 70s. Please don't compare their compensations either.

I'm pretty sure if Beckford has spent his money wisely he has more than enough to sustain him until he dies.

And if he doesn't, I'm sure the £15k per week at Bolton would see him through.

And if not, what's wrong with getting a new job career and working until 65-70 like the rest of us.

Suggesting an overpaid footballer should be able to retire at 35 does not give me any more sympathy for them!!!!!!!