Leeds have placed Jermaine Beckford on the transfer list, after our leading scorer turned down the offer of a new contract.
On the official site Chief executive Shaun Harvey said:"The offer we have made to Jermaine is what we believe to be a very good offer, but he has exercised his right to turn it down. On the basis that he has 12 months remaining on his current contract and could leave on a free transfer next summer, we feel we must consider any offers that are forthcoming for him.
"In the event that no offers are forthcoming or the offers received are unacceptable to us then he will remain part of Simon Grayson's squad next season." QPR, Newcastle and Coventry have all been suggested as possible destinations for the player, so we can live in hope that all three clubs will start a bidding war that will bump up the price for his services.
So, is this all down to money, or was Beckford determined to move up a division next season? In the wake of the failure to strike a deal with Douglas last week, it looks like the former, and that Pappa Smurf is going to play hardball with players and their agents who are less than realistic with their wage demands.
In a way this is refreshing, as we did of course get into this mess in the first place by paying wages we couldn’t afford, but without a couple of leading players it’s starting to look as though next season might be a bit tougher than we expected.
We will definitely need a new striker now, so we can but hope that we get at least £2 Million for Beckford, and that every penny of the transfer fee is made available to Grayson to re-invest in the playing squad.