Orikoru
Tour Winner
I honestly don't think this any different to how most deals seem to get done these days. Clubs obviously speak to players and agents to sound out moves ahead of time. No loyalty or morals in football, to expect some is foolhardy. At least he didn't leave on a free, is all you can say.Without going too much into it and to (try to) summarise;
- Club have been actively trying to get him to sign a new deal for months which would have paid him more and secured the club with a higher release clause
- He's chosen not to do this and instead his agent has touted this (previously unknown to literally everyone except those present at the contract signing, apparently) release clause to other clubs in the last few days to force a move.
- Spurs have activated it and he's gone without so much of a hesitation having previously stated that "there's nowhere else he'd rather be" after the club celebrated his 100 appearances in a Forest shirt.
- The club have deleted ALL evidence of the new shirt teasers they put out yesterday morning as it turns out Gibbs-White was heavily involved in the promotional content they'd been creating for the shirt release. If they had ANY inkling of him leaving, they'd have left him out of this entirely, rather than having to panic re-cut and botch a video together for the shirt release last minute yesterday.
- I'm also not so sure they'd have sold Elanga if they'd known that they'd be getting a good chunk of profit for Gibbs-White with a sale.
I get that this happens all the time in football and it's just business - but still doesn't sit well. you still have the odd few loyal players (see Bruno Fernandes) and I thought Gibbs-White was different after we welcomed him and gave him a home after Wolves fans scathed him and his other half all over social media (and at games).
It's not him leaving that's the issue, he was always going to leave at SOME point - it's how he's gone about it.