Has West Brom interest turned Jamie’s head or is there more to it?

There was a great quote that I read yesterday from Vital Swansea on Twitter which simply read “There are 3 sides to every story, in this case – the club’s, Paterson’s, and then there’s the truth.”   This is absolutely bang on the money on an afternoon when the only side of the story we probably had was the one that the club would want us to believe.

We do not yet know what the side of Jamie Paterson was and then – when we hear that – we have to draw our own conclusions as to what events led to the public reports yesterday that Jamie Paterson refused to be selected for Huddersfield because he was “not in the right frame of mind.”

In itself that is disrespectful to Russell Martin, disrespectful to Swansea City and very disrespectful to the 1100 travelling Jacks who made the trip to Huddersfield on Saturday afternoon.  And for that alone Jamie Paterson should be ashamed at the very least.

We now have to wonder what happened in the lead up to that level of disrespect.   It is just seven days since the club announced that they had triggered the extension clause in Jamie Paterson’s contract early.  “We triggered the extension a little bit early so that’s nothing to worry about now,” said boss Russell Martin at the time.   It all seemed so simple, Paterson had extended his contract which we all assumed was done early in response to the press speculation that Championship clubs were beginning to circle around the opportunity to sign him.

The extension made sense for club and player.   Jamie Paterson has struggled throughout his career to get the regular run of consistent performances that he has put in this season and his manager had talked about how he was the first player he had thought about signing when appointed Swansea boss.   Sometimes you get that moment where a player, manager and club all come together at the right time and Paterson, Martin and Swansea felt just that.   The extension was natural.

Paterson missed Saturday’s 1-1 draw with Huddersfield and nobody really batted an eyelid as the manager put it down as a Covid related absence.   We all accepted that and most would have hoped that he was fit for the visit of Preston next weekend.

However, behind the scenes it was clear that all was not well and Paterson’s ‘tantrum’ to not play was explained away by the club this afternoon with the information being released through selected journalists to effectively call into question Paterson’s professionalism.   Rightly so, based on the level of disrespect that we talked about earlier.

But all we know at the moment is what the club want us to know.  Paterson refused to play, claimed his frame of mind was wrong and it looks like he is on the way from the Swans within the next two weeks.   That’s what we have been told but surely there is more to it than that.

Firstly, we should not totally ignore the interest that has come from elsewhere (officially or unofficially) and particularly West Brom.   Bigger budgets, bigger wages and a bigger chance of Premier League football (at least for next season) will turn a player’s head.  Particularly a player who has been that professional who has struggled for consistency.  Jamie Paterson has just turned thirty years of age and may never get the chance again that could come his way in this transfer window.  That will not be lost on the player and it will not be lost on his representatives.   And it will prove to be a factor in this somewhere along the line.  As it would for you and me if we had the chance to increase our wages.

Secondly, there is this contract extension.   It has been reported/rumoured (take your pick which one) that it would be triggered at twenty-five appearances.  Jamie Paterson has twenty-one.  The club did the right thing here in trying to trigger it early and it all seemed – based on the press reports – that it had all been done.   But had it?   Did we have verbal agreement but never a signature on the all important document. Did the signing of Fisher and Christie in the week mean that Paterson went back on a verbal agreement feeling that the club were still tying him into a cheap deal.   If he has signed the contract and seven days later he is moaning about the wages he signed up to then I am genuinely lost for words.

On the subject of the contract extension then this is a key element of course in the middle of this as the value to the Swans in the transfer market is different in a 6 and 18 month deal.  Not that a 30 year old winger on a half decent half a season is worth a fortune but he is worth more with an 18 month contract than a 6 month one.   We have to hope (and assume) at this stage that all parties have signed up to the extended contract officially as it is pretty clear that yesterday’s events mean that there is little hope of the two sides being able to work together.

We did see at some stage yesterday afternoon the possibility of the first suggestions coming out of the Paterson camp with people claiming that the club went back on increasing his wages which led to the player asking not to be picked but at the moment this is nothing more than some random people on Twitter either causing trouble or just passing on what they have been asked to.    This goes back to the early comment in this article about three sides to every story.  Add to that there was some discussion around wider discontent in the first team squad (was this part of a Paterson story?) but that doesn’t wash at all on the back of what was one of our best 45 minutes this season on Saturday at Huddersfield.

Neither the club or the player will come out of this with all their credit intact.   I have no doubt that the club have acted in their best interests (as we would want them to) by discussing the contract extension, announcing it (early?) and wanting to tie the player down.   All good there but was there really a need yesterday to let the dispute play itself out in public?   Paterson of course will be vilified (and to a large extent rightly so) for refusing to play and that in itself for me is enough to say he should probably never play for Swansea City again.

On the subject of those three sides to the story I suspect we will hear two of them but never really get the true picture as to what the third one is.   My gut feel says that Paterson has clearly had his head turned by the alleged interest  and wants to leave.   I’m not sure what happened in the contract discussions but my gut says that verbally we agreed terms but they never materialised into a signed deal and there is that final piece that maybe the wages offered to Fisher and Christie this week has annoyed Paterson and he has produced an about turn on the deal and the club are not prepared to match his demands.    Any (and all) of these are possible but it doesn’t excuse that disrespect which, frankly, is probably unforgiveable.

Of course we have one last scenario to consider and that is that with just two weeks left in the transfer window there is no guarantee that someone actually comes in with a move for the player and that come February 1st Jamie Paterson remains a Swansea City player.   At that point we simply have to ask what happens then because bridges have certainly be burned.

Assuming though – as is likely – that Paterson is not here come that 1st day in February we look back on a 21 game Swansea City career with an acknowledgement that he had some good games but ultimately there were just those 21 appearances and he is far from irreplacable.

Let’s see what the next 48 hours brings as there is undoubtedly more to follow.