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Home›Players›The Suarez Clause

The Suarez Clause

By Michael Price
August 6, 2013
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Clause  (klôz) n.

1. Grammar A group of words containing a subject and a predicate and forming part of a compound or complex sentence.

2. A distinct article, stipulation, or provision in a document.

[Middle English, from Old French, from Medieval Latin clausa, close of a rhetorical period, from feminine of Latin clausus, past participle of claudere, to close.]

It seems that we Arsenal supporters are all becoming legal scholars these days as we are inundated with daily stories around a reported clause in Luiz Suarez’s current Liverpool contract.  Exactly what that clause is and what it states seems to be open to interpretation depending on which side of the transfer-drama du jour you fall on.

If you are a Liverpool supporter you likely believe that the clause only entitles Suarez to be informed that an offer over £40,000,000 has come in. End of.

If you are an Arsenal supporter and a member of Arsenal’s hierarchy you likely believe that the clause is in effect a release clause and that it has been met. Now forget for a minute how Arsenal would know about the release clause (it’s not hard to figure out.) The fact remains that both Arsenal and Suarez’s representatives strongly feel that the clause has been met.

So we are at an impasse it would seem. It reminds me of the Clinton trial and the definition of the word “is” is. I won’t bore you with the lurid details of that but suffice it to say his whole impeachment defense was focused around that little word and what it really meant in the context of a sexual act. Too much.

Here we are presented on trying to define what is or isn’t a release clause.

Well, let me start by saying, I am not a legal scholar and I haven’t played one on TV. But we can all assume why clauses are included in contracts. They are included in contracts to trigger an event. Be it a payment, a penalty or say a release from one’s contract.

We’re not privy to the conversations around the negotiations related to Suarez’s contract. We don’t know exactly what the point was. But it’s clear that Suarez knew that it was likely his Champion’s League opportunities were going to dwindle as Liverpool readjusted themselves for the future. It’s likely he would negotiate into this contract some sort of way to get to play in the Champion’s League should that prospect seem unlikely with Liverpool.

I am no fan of Suarez (for proof read this). I am also under no delusion that Arsenal was his first choice. He clearly had his heart set on Real Madrid. But Madrid have their hearts set on a certain Welshman and Ancelotti and crew seem very happy with their stable of forwards. I also have no doubt that if Suarez does come to Arsenal unless they win things he will likely be off again in 2-3 years. It’s his MO.

That’s all moot. When Real Madrid didn’t come calling, Suarez wasn’t likely to sit put. He wants a chance to play in the premier tournament in Europe. Liverpool are likely still a few years away from returning to that. Arsenal need to play two games but still represent a better chance.

Therefore it’s likely that his representatives knowing Arsenal’s hunt for a forward informed the club of the stipulation in his contract thinking that the £40 million was a release clause based on whether or not a Champion’s League team came calling.

This definition of what a clause is gets further clouded by the fact that some would argue that Arsenal’s playoff in August isn’t Champion’s League but a playoff. However, those same doubters would no doubt be calling themselves a Champion’s League team if positions were reversed.

So it now comes down to definitions. Both sides are fairly confident in their positions. Suarez’s camp is incensed at what it feels are broken promises by Liverpool management. They’ve gone out of their way to insure fans know it’s not about them. Sad to say it won’t matter. Robin Van Persie with his “Statement to the fans” is a prime example that fans will still look on said player negatively.

It’s clear Suarez wants out. Liverpool aren’t in and no one else is coming in. By virture of his actions, his level of mistrust with the owners and management of Liverpool he has already made his position untenable.

I listened to an interview with Steven Gerrard the other day and I couldn’t tell if it was his scouse accent or a genuine desire to cry knowing what losing Suarez would mean to Liverpool. Let’s face it Arsenal fans we know what losing your best player means to a club. We’re lucky in that we have a manager who can help navigate through that (somewhat) and preserve even a modest amount of dignity. Liverpool aren’t so lucky as they are stuck with the managerial version of David Brent. Any man who has a large picture of himself, spouts inane wisdom that Yogi Berra would be proud of and lugs around a manifesto to every job is sketchy at best.

But I digress.

The fact remains is that this really does look like its going for the long haul. Suarez if he really wants out will have to either ask for Premier League/FA arbitration in the matter or will have to openly agitate for a move – i.e. transfer request. The only reason I see for one not being submitted yet is that they must feel strongly in the intent of the clause in the contract.

Personally, I don’t know why you put a clause in a contract if it’s only to inform someone of something. Frankly, if a bid comes in and you weren’t going to sell you wouldn’t need a clause just to inform of an event. If Liverpool thought it was and Suarez’s camp thinks otherwise than it is a poorly written clause and makes it even more likely that only legal action will resolve the issue. And even then regardless of the outcome all parties will feel aggrieved.

Like I’ve been on record as saying, I don’t  deny that Suarez is a supremely talented player but with the baggage that wants you to stay away from him. However, our ship has firmly been tied to this rock. If Arsenal don’t do this business it will be just a messy for them as it will be for Suarez in Liverpool.

I think the business gets done and everything we are hearing now is just a case of saving face by Liverpool.

Originally, we heard that he wouldn’t be sold under no circumstances. Then we heard how angry Liverpool are at Arsenal for continuing their pursuit.   Then we heard that it would take a monster bid the size of a Bale like deal. Soon I expect we’ll hear how sad Liverpool are that it has come to this. Finally, we’ll likely see acceptance of the bid. Sounds familiar? That’s because it’s the Kübler-Ross model, commonly referred to as the “five stages of grief.”

Regardless of all of that it is all going to come down to how ugly people want this to be and ultimately what the definition of the clause is.

TagsAFCArsenalArsenal FCArseneArsene WengerLuis SuarezSuarezTransfers
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10 comments

  1. stag133 8 August, 2013 at 01:42 Log in to Reply

    It appears Tottenham have signed our fictitious target from last year… Capoue for about 10 Mill…
    what have we done?
    oh, right… we’re on “stand by”… with a club who says its not selling their best player, the PFA has said there is NO CLAUSE in his contract… and he’s training away from the club because he’s shown absolute disrespect to a club who have coddled him despite his outrageous behavior on the pitch.

    oh joy. we’re going to compete for trophies this year, no doubt…

    • soccerfreak 8 August, 2013 at 19:42 Log in to Reply

      “What have we done ?”

      Well, just in that we finally sold off Gervinho too. That too for an extortionate sum of £8 million. I think our best negotiators are out there selling off players, and would come back only when TGSTEL finds a new home for himself.

      • stag133 9 August, 2013 at 05:51 Log in to Reply

        Yes, we bought Santos, Gervinho, & Chamakh…
        Brilliant buys… by the great one, Wenger.
        Glad we sold 2/3 of that group, and maybe Chamakh will be sent on loan this week to West Ham…
        Still can’t get anyone in the world to take Bendtner, because his bloated salary and ego, are just too much to handle…

        that’s really wonderful, we keep selling… releasing players… salary paid is down, and we recoup some money on the awful trio mentioned above…

        and so far, we have Yaya Sanogo on a FREE.

        the folks on here can say whatever they want, about how Liverpool “have to sell”… but they don’t… their owner John Henry says… they won’t…
        there is NO CLAUSE, says the PFA… and the player has absolutely NO RECOURSE.
        What do you think he’s going to do … refuse to play football at Liverpool, and forfeit his salary for the season?
        That ought to increase his value…
        Suarez to Arsenal is a LAUGH… and the jokes on the Arsenal supporters.
        The club KNOW he’s not being sold, and its all a big smoke screen for the suckers… so the club can say we were all in for BITE-MAN, and the meanies at Liverpool wouldn’t sell us their best player, so we’re going to go with what we have.

        After all, Wenger has stated, this current team can win the league…

  2. stag133 7 August, 2013 at 04:54 Log in to Reply

    yeah, well… once again John Henry said today… he is not being sold.
    they do NOT have to do a damned thing… he’s under contract.
    if they simply don’t sell him, is he going to refuse to play, and give up his salary?
    I mean, I know he’s insane, so that’s possibility… maybe he’d just bite someone else on the pitch, so he gets another suspension…

    Liverpool are not going to improve Arsenal FC…
    they would sell him for less to another club, in another country…
    it makes no sense to sell a player, to a team that you are trying to catch in the standings…

    sorry you dreamers, or nightmare lovers… he’s NEVER coming to Arsenal.

    and Rooney isn’t going to Chelsea either… he can bitch and whine and mope, and request a transfer all he likes, but he’s under contract, and United aren’t in the business of improving direct rivals… they don’t need the money.

  3. DaAdminGooner 7 August, 2013 at 01:08 Log in to Reply

    Suarez has spoken:

    “I want to move to play in the Champions League, and there is a club offering me that opportunity,” said the Uruguay international. “I have told the manager that I want to leave the club.

    “I am being accused of showing a lack of loyalty, but last year I had the opportunity to move to a big European club and I stayed, on the understanding that if we did not qualify for the Champions League the following season then I would be allowed to go.

    “I gave absolutely everything last season but it was not enough to give us a top-four finish. Now all I want is that Liverpool honour our agreement.

    “Last season, we told Liverpool there was interest from a top European club but they told me, ‘We have a new coach, we are going to push for the Champions League’.

    “I spoke with Brendan Rodgers several times and he told me, ‘Stay another season, and you have my word, if we don’t make it then I will personally make sure that you can leave.’

    “Liverpool is a club with a reputation for doing things the right way, I just want them to abide by the promises made last season.”

    “I am 26, I need to be playing in the Champions League,” he continued. “I feel I have done enough to be playing in the Champions League at this stage of my career. Now there is an option for me to do that and I want very much to take it.

    “I don’t feel betrayed but the club promised me something a year ago just as I promised them that I would stay and try everything possible to get us into the Champions League. ”

    Suarez, who has served a ban for racially abusing Manchester United defender Patrice Evra during a match and is currently suspended for BITING Chelsea’s Branislav Ivanovic (he will miss the first six games of the coming season) said:

    “That was the moment to show my loyalty to Liverpool and I did. They had given me my chance in England and stood up for me through my ban.

    “I know I have made mistakes in my time here but I have apologised many times over. This is not about that. This is about the club having agreed to something both verbally and in the contract which they are now not honouring.

    “They gave me their word a year ago and now I want them to honour that. It is not just something verbal with the coach but something that is written in the contract.”

    “I have the club’s word and we have the written contract and we are happy to take this to the Premier League for them to decide the case, but I do not want it to come to that,” added Suarez. “We have the backing of the PFA.”

    “I have no problem playing in England for many more years,” he said. “Right now the Premier League is the biggest and most important.

    “If we are just talking about the level of the football and the way the supporters are then it is an incredible league. Any player in the world at the moment would like to play in the Premier League.”

    Trying to explain his attack on the media, he added, “I had just arrived in Uruguay, where the press are very good to me, because I am one of theirs. They asked me about the press in England and what am I going to say? Of course I don’t like the fact that my wife goes to the supermarket and there are photographers.

    “But I realise that the press attention is the same wherever you go.”

    In the lengthy piece, Suarez also said: “I don’t think the [Liverpool] supporters are angry, I think they understand a player when he has the ambition to triumph at the highest level.

    “I am 26, I was a long time at Ajax without playing many games in the Champions League.

    “I’m not going to another club to hurt Liverpool. I am always going to be grateful to Liverpool for everything. But I have to put my career first. People say Liverpool deserve more from me but I have scored 50 goals in less than 100 games and now I could double the money they paid for me.

    “I just ask that they respect the objectives I have in my career. I don’t want things to end badly. I just want us to come to an amicable agreement according to what was agreed.

  4. Kiwi 6 August, 2013 at 23:51 Log in to Reply

    What’s the point in analysing something as specific as a clause if no one has seen it? Seems the ultimate waste of time. The only thing I’ll say specifically about the clause is I tend to agree with you Mike, assuming there is a clause related to the players exit and stating a fee, it seems unlikely that it stops at simply informing the player – where’s the value in that to the player?

    The Liverpool hierarchy (owner, CEO and manager… even captain Gerrard) seem to be allowing this transfer to become a little personal as evidenced by their use of public slurs against Arsenal. That’s strange. There is a lot of historic goodwill between Arsenal and Liverpool going back to the tragedies that scarred Liverpool and Arsenal’s sympathetic, publically supportive and classy response to those events. Quite why Liverpool are taking a publicly dismissive and provocative approach on this one transfer is lost on me. Seems a strategy with no upside. Suarez wants to go, he has limited options for the reasons we’ve discussed, Arsenal are offering serious money, Arsenal are dealing with it confidentially, what’s the big deal? This IS the accepted way in football. How else do players change clubs?

    There is a lot of nonsense in the media where men and women with no financial sense at all talk dribble. The 40m pound offer from Arsenal is a seriously realistic offer – and comparisons with other recent transfers miss the point. Suarez has baggage – this dims his value. He’s not unblemished like Radamel Falcao or Edinson Cavani who both went to French clubs who have little to offer but big money – the French league is very second tier. So how can you simplistically compare their fees to Suarez? If you doubt that logic, contrast Rooney, even moneybags Chelsea aren’t even offering United what Arsenal are for Suarez. You see valuation at this heady level is a nuanced and individualistic calculation. The player’s worth is a mixture of perception and reality. It’s what a willing club(s) is prepared to spend with an eye to what other elite deals are happening. And frankly, what the selling club is prepared to accept is not an equal factor in the equation. If the player wants to go, which is usually the case… the overwhelming evidence is that he goes. What’s the upside to keeping a player who doesn’t want to wear your colours?

    This is why clubs want to evolve to the elite level of the game. The higher you are on the elite perception index (EPI) the easier it becomes to retain your players… you just don’t have to have as many fights to retain your top players. The Real’s and Barça’s of today keep their stars a lot more easily than the Arsenal’s… or the Spurs… and so it goes down the ladder. The higher you are perceived to be on the EPI the more you can concentrate on winning and procuring the next star and sustaining your position. It’s a virtuous cycle of success. When you’re at the top of the foodchain – you do the eating. The great club managers like Alex Ferguson understand this reality and shape their policies to achieve it. Ferguson moved United into the top echelon of the EPI and then every year or two he chomped on the prey lower down with a mix of large and medium sized meals. He understood the natural order. My fear with Wenger is that he doesn’t, or if he does he resents it at a philosophical level. Arsenal will struggle to attain and maintain a seat in the top echelon if Wenger doesn’t accept the realities of professional football. You gotta eat.

  5. WrongFootPele 6 August, 2013 at 21:53 Log in to Reply

    Let’s say we’re willing to wait until August 27/28 to see if we make the Champions League group stage in order to get Suarez on the “cheap.” What happens if we don’t actually win that two-game playoff? Do we simply bid more for Suarez and hope Liverpool caves? Does Suarez still want to come to Arsenal if we don’t advance to the group stage?

  6. DaAdminGooner 6 August, 2013 at 20:46 Log in to Reply

    Like I said. If Liverpool were in a similar situation – you know without a doubt they’d be arguing they are a Champion’s League squad.

    • stag133 9 August, 2013 at 05:53 Log in to Reply

      yawn.
      it’s not relevant.
      there is no release clause.

  7. caribkid 6 August, 2013 at 20:40 Log in to Reply

    From what I have been able to piece together is that the dispute is over the interpretation of what constitutes a team being in the CL. Liverpool contends that Arsenal are not in the CL yet, but are merely in the qualification stage, whilst Arsenal and the Suarez camp believes that being in the qualifying round is sufficient to trigger the clause.

    Makes not much of a difference because Arsenal will know before the transfer window closes if they are in the main CL draw, which certainly triggers the clause. Regardless, if we do acquire Suarez, we will be paying a monster wage for someone who will automatically not be eligible for EPL play for almost 1/6th of the season.

    Go figure.

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