Leicester's Riyad Mahrez deserves respect for wanting to play at the highest level after Man City move fell over
Get football updates directly to your inbox + Subscribe Thank you for subscribing! Could not subscribe, try again later Invalid Email
Riyad Mahrez will be in turmoil after being denied his dream move to Manchester City – and I don’t blame him.
No disrespect to Leicester, who are perfectly entitled to hold Mahrez to his contract, but he has outgrown them.
Are Leicester ever going to win the title again? No – and they won’t win a trophy of any kind if they keep picking weakened teams in the cup competitions.
Are they ever going to offer him Champions League football again? Probably not.
Do they have much to gain from keeping a disaffected player at the club? Not in my opinion.
Mahrez has seen N’Golo Kante and Danny Drinkwater go to Chelsea, his Algerian team-mate Islam Slimani loaned out to Newcastle and Jamie Vardy nearly joined Arsenal before turning them down.
(Image: Getty Images Europe)
He’s seen other star players being allowed to fly the nest for good money – so why are Leicester demanding a king’s ransom for Mahrez?
A move to City would almost guarantee him winning more trophies, possibly including the Champions League, and a chance to play for Pep Guardiola, arguably the best coach on the planet.
After everything he has done for Leicester – a £460,000 snip who is now worth more than 100 times as much – surely there comes a point where it is churlish to stand in the way of his ambition.
(Image: REUTERS)
What sort of mentality is he going to be in for the rest of the season? Leicester are not going to finish in the top four and they are not going to go down, so I don’t understand why they were not prepared to let him go for £60m, which is what City were believed to be offering.
Is £59.5m not a big enough profit to make on a player who was a huge part in delivering that title miracle in 2016?
In my opinion, Mahrez is worth £75m — but if he wants to go, he's only worth as much as Leicester can get for him.
There is talk of him being fined for failing to show up for training, but I know – from personal experience – how galling it can be when your heart lies elsewhere in football.
(Image: Action Images via Reuters)
When I was a player and I wanted to leave Birmingham for Blackburn, I caused havoc when I didn’t get my way at first.
I’m not proud of my behaviour – I was smashing balls away in training, knocking on doors, getting sent home and being an all-round nuisance – but I never downed tools.
Even when I was made to turn out for the reserves, I applied myself in a professional manner during games although it came to a point, away at Newcastle, where I was only at 95 per cent – and that was the end for me and Steve Bruce, and I got my way.
And I have to admit: If I had been denied my move to Blackburn, I would never have forgiven Bruce.
(Image: PA)
So what does Mahrez do next?
He could tell Leicester he will knuckle down to the end of the season, as required by the terms of his employment, in return for the Foxes promising to revisit his contract in the summer.
Many players now have a stipulated buy-out clause. One option might be for club and player to agree the trigger – somewhere around £50m, nothing outrageous or in the realm of the £142m Liverpool received for Philippe Coutinho.
Or, if Leicester refuse to review his contract, he could make excuses about injury, illness, burn-out, family problems or anxiety. I have heard and seen all of those – because I resorted to many of them myself!
(Image: Leicester City FC)
That is a smarter way of withdrawing your labour than simply telling them he will never kick another ball for the club.
I had a month to make my move to Blackburn happen – but Mahrez only had few days. If City had registered their interest earlier in January, I suspect they would have struck a deal well inside the deadline.
Even now, when Leicester look at the bigger picture, surely they will have to concede that Riyad Mahrez has been an unbelievably good player for them... but it’s time to let him fulfil his potential.
Will Mahrez be shunned as an outcast in the dressing room by his team-mates? I doubt it – my best guess is that he will be welcomed back with open arms by the players – probably with a generous helping good-humoured banter on the training ground.
(Image: Getty)
It will be interesting to see if he loses the plot. Like I said, I would have been smashing the manager’s door down.
But it goes to show how unsettling a transfer window can be: One minute your star player is performing right at the top of his game, the next his head is all over the place when the champions-elect bid for him.
The biggest worry is that it will destroy Mahrez mentally if City look elsewhere in the summer and he never gets another opportunity to play for them.
As a player, you have to be selfish sometimes. When West Ham had a problem with Dimitri Payet last season, it turned out to be in everyone’s best interests that he was sold.
He was never going to be of much use to them while he was tossing and turning at night, and sulking every day in training.
(Image: Plumb Images)
And in the case of Mahrez, I see no benefit in keeping a player who may only go through the motions.
Playing for City in the Champions League, or winning the title, will energise him and make him keep raising the bar instead of being stuck in a comfort zone with Leicester in mid-table.
What is wrong with ambition, and wanting to play at the highest possible level?
I respect Mahrez for that – and I hope he will be given the chance to make his dreams come true.