'Fancy Dan' footballers quote

[@owlstalk]

36 minutes ago, ZicoSterland2 said:

Your facts....best laugh ever. So are you disputing when he legged it to Italy he said he would be returning to Sheffield Wednesday.

 

 

[@owlstalk]

[DJMortimer]

4 minutes ago, ZicoSterland2 said:

Even DJ Mortimer who is obviously ante Dave Richards seems to recall Di Canio stated he would be back. Im sure the club didnt say go back to Italy then refuse to come back. So your point is ??.

 

You really need to read more about who Di Canio is without being consumed with such bitterness. There is no question he was a borderline maniac who had regular differences with managers and chairmen; even those that liked him. All that is hardly a secret or genius deduction. The player said it was the club's idea for him to go back home and I've seen nothing since to refute that. But it is a fact that the chairman claimed he could not find him when a Sky reporter was chasing him around his home town on a moped.

 

There has been plenty of inference and speculation about the damage Di Canio did - even the silly claim that his ghost was still ruining the squad a year or more after he left. Never mind the admiration some held him in for his ability, standards and work ethic. So let me indulge in a little guesswork of my own. Di Canio was possibly the highest maintenance player we have ever had and Richards simply could not come to terms with this volatility and outspokenness (this is after all a man who reportedly demanded everyone addressed him as 'Mr Chairman'). His preference was to get rid of him but knew the supporters would have been outraged. The Alcock pantomime gave him his opportunity. He realised that it would not take much to get the player to do the dirty work for him. So there followed some inflammatory comments in the press, the failure to represent him or even attend the disciplinary hearing, the lie about where he went afterwards and so forth. Di Canio with all his ego and instability, duly reacted as expected and the door was opened for his exit without anything like the criticism that there would have been just a few weeks earlier.

 

As for Richards; the record on him is perfectly clear and does not paint a nice picture. Journalist David Conn in particular has published several pieces on him. His career is a litany of personal achievement despite incompetence and often at the expense of others. It doesn't require much interpretation on my part. But he is hardly the kind of character that should trusted implicitly.

 

 

 

[@owlstalk]

[@owlstalk]

1 minute ago, DJMortimer said:

 

You really need to read more about who Di Canio is without being consumed with such bitterness. There is no question he was a borderline maniac who had regular differences with managers and chairmen; even those that liked him. All that is hardly a secret or genius deduction. The player said it was the club's idea for him to go back home and I've seen nothing since to refute that. But it is a fact that the chairman claimed he could not find him when a Sky reporter was chasing him around his home town on a moped.

 

There has been plenty of inference and speculation about the damage Di Canio did - even the silly claim that his ghost was still ruining the squad a year or more after he left. Never mind the admiration some held him in for his ability, standards and work ethic. So let me indulge in a little guesswork of my own. Di Canio was possibly the highest maintenance player we have ever had and Richards simply could not come to terms with this volatility and outspokenness (this is after all a man who reportedly demanded everyone addressed him as 'Mr Chairman'). His preference was to get rid of him but knew the supporters would have been outraged. The Alcock pantomime gave him his opportunity. He realised that it would not take much to get the player to do the dirty work for him. So there followed some inflammatory comments in the press, the failure to represent him or even attend the disciplinary hearing, the lie about where he went afterwards and so forth. Di Canio with all his ego and instability, duly reacted as expected and the door was opened for his exit without anything like the criticism that there would have been just a few weeks earlier.

 

As for Richards; the record on him is perfectly clear and does not paint a nice picture. Journalist David Conn in particular has published several pieces on him. His career is a litany of personal achievement despite incompetence and often at the expense of others. It doesn't require much interpretation on my part. But he is hardly the kind of character that should trusted implicitly.

 

 

 

This is spot on and your references to David Conn's articles are bang on the money too 

I bet all your points are dismissed and ignored though and if you DO get a reply it'll be along the lines of 'yeah we'll my opinion differs to yours' etc

Absolute total unwillingness from some to listen to any sort of facts and to just rely on their own stubborn egotistical opinion

[@owlstalk]

 

For the ragged Owls of Sheffield Wednesday, limping in League One between winding-up petitions, today's life-threatening crisis is the culmination of 10 troubled years beneath the Premier League bounty which the club's former chairman, Sir Dave Richards, so richly enjoys.

 

Richards left Wednesday in February 2000, when the club he ran were bottom of the Premier League, heading for certain relegation, making losses, owing £16m to the Co-operative Bank, and weighed down by a swollen wage bill for poor signings which would deepen the overdraft and debts in the Football League. Richards, whose own business, Three Star Engineering, was heading for insolvency, was personally championed within the Premier League by Ken Bates, then Chelsea's chairman, and approved by the clubs as their first paid chairman – his salary £176,667 for the part-time role. Over the decade, that salary package has risen 77%, to £314,000 last year.

 

Wednesday, now owing £23m to the bank and £1m in unpaid tax, were last week given a 28-day stay of execution in the winding-up court, but face another petition, for £400,000 outstanding VAT, next Wednesday, 1 December, the real deadline. The directors of the venerable club – one of the world's oldest, having been formed in 1867 – took their place, during this football boom-time, among the bust victims of recession, to be rebuked in court 55.

 

"You are clearly trading insolvently," Mr Registrar Jacques warned them. "And you are very probably doing so using HMRC money."

 

While Wednesday have declined to such ignominy, the Premier League has flourished and Richards has risen unstoppably to heady influence. He is deputy chair of the Football Association, chair of the FA's Club England, which runs the national team, and represents the Premier League abroad as chair of the European Professional Leagues. Throughout this rise, to borrow a literary classic, Sheffield Wednesday have been the picture of Dorian Gray in Sir Dave Richards's attic.

 

Chaired since the summer by their former manager Howard Wilkinson, Wednesday have been given until Friday by the Co-op to present firm offers of new investment, because the bank wants no repeat of last week's 11th-hour courtroom chaos. "We are doing everything possible to avoid administration," Wilkinson said this week.

 

The terms look generous for a takeover of what should still be one of England's bigger clubs. The bank, its loans unpaid for so long, is prepared to write off £16m and roll on with only £7m owed, if an acceptable new owner comes forward guaranteeing enough money, understood to be as little as £4m, to pay the club's tax and ongoing losses at least until the end of next season.

Several directors and former directors are also owed a total of £4m, loaned to the club in its years of penury. Bob Grierson, 67, owed £150,000, an accountant with formal responsibility for the club's financial management, has been on the club's board for 21 years, having been appointed on 5 October 1989, the same day as Richards. Another, Geoff Hulley, 80, owed £300,000, was one of the club's directors on 15 April 1989, when 96 Liverpool fans died at the Hillsborough ground which, as Lord Justice Taylor reported, was unsafe in crucial respects.

Keith Addy, 76, a builder and also a Wednesday director at the time of the disaster, resigned from the board in January 2008, but remains a loan note holder. Two others are another current director, Ken Cooke, 60, and a former director, Mick Wright, 63, who continues to attend board meetings as an observer.

 

Those five are said by Wednesday sources to have agreed to take "a huge hit" on what they are owed if necessary for a takeover. The largest loan note holder, reported to be owed £2.4m, is the former chairman who picked the club up after the Richards era, now Chesterfield FC's majority shareholder – the Sheffield casino owner Dave Allen.

 

Last week Allen rejected as "derisory" an offer from Milan Mandaric, who is flush from selling Leicester City to the owners of the Thai duty free company King Power. Mandaric's offer, to pay £7m and thereby wipe out the bank debt, is thought to remain a possibility as Wilkinson works to find another solution.

 

The inner politics have become tortured; before last week's court hearing Wright and Cooke, with the local car dealership entrepreneur Garry Scotting, presented plans for a takeover. Wednesday fans have argued that Cooke's role as a director and Wright's as a board observer create a conflict of interest when the board considers other bids, prompting a protest before last night's home game against Walsall.

 

Wilkinson, though, insisted it is not so, saying: "I firmly believe that none of the board members or loan note holders will be the barrier to saving this club."

 

Yesterday the supporters' groups, under the banner of One Wednesday, united to call for fans to contribute to a "community investment scheme", designed to incorporate supporter ownership alongside individual wealthy fans. Scotting is now part of it, one of 12 wealthy fans who have promised £2m, and he argues Cooke and Wright should be "accepted with open arms", if they can make the difference.

 

The One Wednesday statement accepted the timing for raising enough money is desperately tight. "Though it is our intention to do everything in our power to try," it said.

All of which is a nightmare barely contemplated in Richards' early years, when Wednesday finished third in the top flight in 1992, before blowing the subsequent Sky TV bonanza on a clutch of overpriced signings. When Wednesday went down in 2000 – Richards, by then Premier League chairman, was elsewhere, handing the trophy to Manchester United – contracts he had agreed guaranteed Premier League-sized wages for three further years to Gerald Sibon, Gilles de Bilde, Simon Donnelly and Phil O'Donnell, who became landmarks to unaffordable extravagance in the Football League. Through Allen's time, and despite his loans, Wednesday have never shaken off that indebtedness, and the slump finally deepened to a full financial crisis when they were relegated again to League One, on the final day of last season.

 

The Co-op, whose attitude has finally hardened from the sometimes baffling patience shown over a decade, retains the option of putting Wednesday into administration if no realistic offers are received by Friday. However, the bank is reluctant to do so given the uncertainty of how much it would recover from £23m of its members' money, the 10-point penalty the club would incur, and the hideous consequences for creditors, who would receive next to nothing after the ethical bank has spent so long propping up the fallen club.

 

"We are doing what we can to support a solvent deal," a bank spokesman said. "We have tried to support the club but we have made it clear to the directors that there does have to be new investment."

 

Meanwhile, the man who was chairman when this spiral of decline began, keeps busy as Premier League chairman and deputy chair of the FA, where he is known for the firmness of his views on how football should be run.

[DJMortimer]

1 minute ago, @owlstalk said:

 

This is the crux of the entire affair. However we may differ on our opinions of the personalities involved, surely we can all agree that the highest priority was the standing and performance of the club? Either we chose to support him, including the challenges of his madness, and restored our best player to the team, or we did what was necessary to maintain his value and sold him. Instead, we did neither - the very worst course of action. There can be no question that Richards, Mackrell and Wilson are enormously culpable for that. Di Canio is not without blame either obviously. But I believe the situation could have been salvaged with better management from the top, one way or the other.

 

All of this did not cause our relegation and years of debt, but it was certainly a couple of large steps in that direction.

 

 

[ZicoSterland2]

4 minutes ago, DJMortimer said:

 

You really need to read more about who Di Canio is without being consumed with such bitterness. There is no question he was a borderline maniac who had regular differences with managers and chairmen; even those that liked him. All that is hardly a secret or genius deduction. The player said it was the club's idea for him to go back home and I've seen nothing since to refute that. But it is a fact that the chairman claimed he could not find him when a Sky reporter was chasing him around his home town on a moped.

 

There has been plenty of inference and speculation about the damage Di Canio did - even the silly claim that his ghost was still ruining the squad a year or more after he left. Never mind the admiration some held him in for his ability, standards and work ethic. So let me indulge in a little guesswork of my own. Di Canio was possibly the highest maintenance player we have ever had and Richards simply could not come to terms with this volatility and outspokenness (this is after all a man who reportedly demanded everyone addressed him as 'Mr Chairman'). His preference was to get rid of him but knew the supporters would have been outraged. The Alcock pantomime gave him his opportunity. He realised that it would not take much to get the player to do the dirty work for him. So there followed some inflammatory comments in the press, the failure to represent him or even attend the disciplinary hearing, the lie about where he went afterwards and so forth. Di Canio with all his ego and instability, duly reacted as expected and the door was opened for his exit without anything like the criticism that there would have been just a few weeks earlier.

 

As for Richards; the record on him is perfectly clear and does not paint a nice picture. Journalist David Conn in particular has published several pieces on him. His career is a litany of personal achievement despite incompetence and often at the expense of others. It doesn't require much interpretation on my part. But he is hardly the kind of character that should trusted implicitly.

 

 

 

Would agree Richards was no great loss.His treatment of Ron Atkinson was shameful. Also thought he treated Francis poorly. Honestly dont think though that Di Canio ever had any intention of returning so manipulated the situation and got his move to the bright lights .

[@owlstalk]

"Richards took this club to the brink," said David Coupe, the chair of Sheffield Wednesday Shareholders' Association. "Rather than stand and fight, he baled out and left for his cushy job in London. I don't understand his qualifications to be Premier League chairman and on all these boards, running the game."

 

Richards, 58, has been media-shy and given almost no revealing interviews during his 11 years in football. He narrowly beat the local Labour MP Joe Ashton to become a Wednesday director in October 1989, shortly after the Hillsborough Disaster at the club's ground in which 96 Liverpool supporters died. In March 1990 he was the surprise choice to succeed the chairman Bert McGee, who was said to have been broken by the disaster.

 

The club was held culpable in the official report into the disaster by Lord Justice Taylor, who found that Hillsborough was unsafe and that the club's safety certificate was 10 years out of date. Under Richards' chairmanship, Wednesday persistently refused requests by the Hillsborough Family Support Group, Sheffield City Council and supporters' groups to erect a memorial to the disaster at the ground. This caused pain and bitterness among the victims' families until the club finally unveiled a memorial in 1999, more than 10 years after the disaster.

 

On the field, fans remember that in 1992, when Leeds won the First Division in the final season of a united Football League, Wednesday finished third, qualifying for the Uefa Cup. "Leeds have since had shrewd leadership and become a big club," sighed Clive Betts, MP for Sheffield Attercliffe and a Wednesday fan. "We've been mismanaged, frittered our money away and sunk into crisis."

 

Richards' Premier League spin doctor claimed the club enjoyed their best 10 years ever under Richards – a strange claim given they won successive League Championships twice, in 1903 and 1904, and 1929 and 1930, and have won the FA Cup three times. Under Richards, they won the League Cup in 1991; two years later they reached Wembley twice but lost in both the League and FA Cup finals. Thereafter, they slid.

 

In 1997, with clubs in the breakaway Premier League looking to cash in on Sky's TV money and the City's brief flirtation with the game, Wednesday sold 36 per cent of the club for £15.6m to a venture capital firm, Charterhouse.

 

"The idea was terribly simple," a Charterhouse spokesperson said. "Invest relatively cheaply, get Sheffield Wednesday among the top six clubs, fill the big ground, then two years later float at a massive profit. But it all went horribly wrong."

 

The money was spent on mostly unsuccessful players transfer fees and wages. Work on the South Stand ran over budget and has piled on debt rather than made promised riches from entertaining and banqueting.

 

In 1999-2000, Wednesday's disastrous start, which included an 8-0 defeat at Newcastle, led to Betts, Ashton and two other local MPs, Bill Michie and David Blunkett, controversially meeting Charterhouse privately to discuss the club's future.

 

Richards had already become the acting Premier League chairman, when the former chairman, Sir John Quinton of Barclays Bank, was removed after the clubs discovered that two former BSkyB executives, Sam Chisholm and David Chance, had been given a fat contract to negotiate the Premiership's 2001 TV deal. In February 2000, with Wednesday doomed to relegation, Richards resigned to take up a three-year appointment as the Premier League chairman.

 

Joe Ashton, himself a former director, was ready with a quip: "It's like the captain of the Titanic being appointed First Lord of the Admiralty."

Reports at the time quoted his salary at £120,000, although the Premier's latest accounts are not recent enough to verify this and the Premier League refused to confirm it yesterday. He is understood to work between one and two full days per week.

 

Wednesday went down with four players, Gerald Sibon, Gilles de Bilde, Simon Donnelly and Phil O'Donnell, on four-year contracts believed to pay them between £800,000 and £1m per year. Only De Bilde has left, on a free transfer to Anderlecht, the rest swell Wednesday's current £13.4m wage bill – higher than the club's turnover. Wednesday's debts are around £16m, they lost £9m last season. The club secretary, Alan Sykes, said they hope to break even this year, but they will from next year be further imperilled by losing the £4m per year "parachute payments" from the Premier League.

 

"The gap between the Premier and Nationwide Leagues is massive and we have had discussions about ways to bridge it," said Sykes of the so-called Phoenix League.

The City's interest in football burned away, the value of Wednesday's shares plummeted, the flotation never happened and Charterhouse sold out earlier this year to three Wednesday directors for around £2m, a serious loss.

 

The directors, Dave Allan, Keith Addy and Geoff Hulley, gifted 9.4 per cent of the shares to the Wednesday Supporters Trust, which has over 1,000 members, a full-time chief executive, John Hemmingham, and is working to help the club.

 

In July, Richards' business, Three Star Engineering, went bust, citing problems with engineering generally and a strong pound. The main creditor, the Co-Op Bank, suffered, according to the receivers, "a significant shortfall" in their £1.5m borrowings. Trade creditors of close to £1m are unlikely to receive anything, and the wages and redundancy payments for over 120 staff laid off have been met by the Department of Employment. Companies House records show Richards is involved in three new ventures, one registered at his home, but otherwise his main activities are his array of seats at football's top tables.

 

As Premier League chairman, insiders say his chief quality is that he is inoffensive to the often warring factions. However, during the PFA dispute, the chairman of one big club said: "Where is he when we need a strong voice? He's left it all to Richard Scudamore [the Premiership's chief executive]. He should be out there." Now, over the Phoenix League, a concept born of desperation by debt-laden fallen clubs, he is silent again.

 

Among the assets of Richards' holding company, Globalfare, also in receivership, are 237,000 Sheffield Wednesday shares, up for sale. Richards estimates they might realise £38,000, 16p per share. The shares in a relegated club held by a bust company make an eloquent statement themselves, about football's performance in its boom years and the stirring quality of its leadership.

[DJMortimer]

18 minutes ago, adelphi1867 said:

If you are going to make a quote at least use the full text, but you right, we went down at the end of the 99/2000 season, after we continued the policy of purchasing so called crowd pleasing 'Flair' players, Sibon, Debillde and the jocks.

Shreeves and Waddle very nearly kept us up, by bringing in bread & Butter players & winners.

 

Those players were certainly no great shakes, but it seems to me that by far the bigger problem was the likes of Booth, Atherton, Briscoe, Nolan, Newsome etc. who simply could not elevate their performances to the standard required, no matter how hard they worked.

 

As for Shreeves and Waddle bringing in workmanlike players and nearly rescuing us, their only addition to the squad was Barry Horne.

[@owlstalk]

2 minutes ago, DJMortimer said:

 

Those players were certainly no great shakes, but it seems to me that by far the bigger problem was the likes of Booth, Atherton, Briscoe, Nolan, Newsome etc. who simply could not elevate their performances to the standard required, no matter how hard they worked.

 

As for Shreeves and Waddle bringing in workmanlike players and nearly rescuing us, their only addition to the squad was Barry Horne.

 

 

Bang on

[@owlstalk]

[@owlstalk]

 

[@owlstalk]

 

[DJMortimer]

5 minutes ago, DJMortimer said:

 

Those players were certainly no great shakes, but it seems to me that by far the bigger problem was the likes of Booth, Atherton, Briscoe, Nolan, Newsome etc. who simply could not elevate their performances to the standard required, no matter how hard they worked.

 

As for Shreeves and Waddle bringing in workmanlike players and nearly rescuing us, their only addition to the squad was Barry Horne.

 

It's worth noting that even long after the departure of the 'fancy dans' there were divisions in the squad, essentially between the British players and the foreigners. At least three players (from my recollection) have referred to this culture of hostility from the domestically rooted members of the squad. It might have been Gilles de Bilde (knobber that he was) who said that the two factions even had separate areas in the dressing room. If nothing else, it begs the question of just who was alienating who instead of relying on an all too easy narrative.

 

[@owlstalk]

The below article is from 19th September 1998 which shows some of the moves Di Canio made to try and resolve the issues at Sheffield Wednesday after public attacks from Danny Wilson and the Chairman in the weeks before it

A week before Di Canio shoved the referee in the Arsenal game...

 

 

 

PAOLO DI CANIO'S agent is planning talks next week with Danny Wilson, the Sheffield Wednesday manager, and the club's chairman, Dave Richards, in an effort to resolve the Italian striker's future.

 

Di Canio and his midfield countryman Benito Carbone appeared to bear the brunt of Wilson's outburst following his side's lethargic and inept performance in the embarrassing 1-0 home defeat by Cambridge in the Worthington Cup in midweek.

 

Although not directly naming the two Italians, Wilson criticised the commitment of certain players, whom he described as "self-indulgent" and "detrimental to the team".

Moreno and Matteo Roggi, the father and son partnership who act on behalf of Di Canio, are flying into Sheffield for talks with both Richards and Wilson.

[@owlstalk]

13 minutes ago, DJMortimer said:

 

It's worth noting that even long after the departure of the 'fancy dans' there were divisions in the squad, essentially between the British players and the foreigners. At least three players (from my recollection) have referred to this culture of hostility from the domestically rooted members of the squad. It might have been Gilles de Bilde (knobber that he was) who said that the two factions even had separate areas in the dressing room. If nothing else, it begs the question of just who was alienating who instead of relying on an all too easy narrative.

 

 

It was worse than that. 

They had almost had seperate dressing rooms entirely - with the English in one of side of a partition wall and the foreign players in the other

Eventually the wall between them was actually knocked out to make one bigger room

Absolutely mental

[@owlstalk]

Article by Alan Nixon - again showing the atmosphere that Di Canio and Carbone had to experience whilst at our club thanks to Dave Richards and Danny Wilson..

 

 

 

 

BENITO CARBONE'S agent has hit back at the Sheffield Wednesday chairman, Dave Richards, in response to claims that the Italian and his compatriot Paolo Di Canio had "killed" the Hillsborough club.

 

Richards, whose club are at the bottom of the Premiership, has criticised Carbone, who has been involved in a series of disputes with the club, and the controversial Di Canio, who left Wednesday to join West Ham last season, claiming the pair "killed us and are killing the game". This outburst from the Premier League chairman comes as a debate on limiting the number of foreign players in the domestic game is gathering force.

 

However, Giovanni Branchini has warned the club not to make Carbone a scapegoat for the current plight. "Reading Mr Richards' comments has been a very depressing and sad experience for Mr Carbone and myself," Branchini, the player's agent, said. "I respect him as one of the finest people I ever met in football but this clumsy attempt to deflect the blame is very unfair to Benito.

"It is a vicious attempt to make him the scapegoat of a situation where a lot of people should look at themselves in the mirror. The rules are the same for everybody, English and foreigners, as well as for the clubs who remember the inequity of the Bosman ruling, only when they lose one, not get one or two for free. We don't understand why we should be the villains when other very respected English players can follow the same path free of any criticism."

[@owlstalk]

Another article - this time from 1999 after Di Canio was long gone, and this time about the Carbone situation featuring Danny Wilson's extraordinary method of man managing the situation (by not even talking to Carbone anymore)

 

 

 

THE SHEFFIELD Wednesday manager Danny Wilson believes Benito Carbone is no longer committed to the club.

 

Carbone is almost certain to be dropped from today's side for the visit of Everton to Hillsborough as Wilson feels the striker is not prepared to give his all for the Owls. The 28-year-old is still in under a cloud with Wilson after staging a dressing room walk-out before the defeat at Southampton two weeks ago.

 

The Italian was informed he would be a substitute for the game at The Dell and after a confrontation with Wilson caught a taxi to Gatwick, where he flew home to Italy for a holiday.

 

Wilson fined the player two weeks' wages - which he believes was not enough - and, despite an apology, forced him to train with the juniors upon his return to Sheffield.

 

Although Carbone is back training with the first team, Wilson admits that an uneasy peace exists between the player and his team-mates - with silence between manager and player.

 

"I've not spoken to him at all and the reason is we're still waiting for him to come back to us," Wilson said. "He might have returned but I don't think Beni understands the severity of what he did.

 

"Beni's been punished. He was fined two weeks' wages which I thought was very light in consideration of what he did. But everything has to be for Wednesday's benefit. If we feel Beni Carbone can benefit the football club, then so be it.

 

"I'm not going to cut my nose off to spite my face. But we've a player there who can do the business, although at the same time we have to make sure he is committed. So it's now down to him. It's whether he's prepared to play football."

 

Carbone refused to talk to waiting reporters and television cameras yesterday, except to state: "I am ready to play," and "ask the manager" when asked to whether he will resume his Wednesday career.

 

A huge problem for Wilson is the possible reaction of the players, with the Norwegian international Petter Rudi having asserted that the Italian should never have returned.

[@owlstalk]

From September 21st 1999

 

Sheffield Wednesday chairman Dave Richards says Italian striker Benito Carbone and former team-mate Paolo Di Canio have 'killed us and are killing the game'.

The outburst from Richards, who is the Premier League's chairman, will add fuel to the growing debate on whether the number of foreign players in the domestic game should be limited.

 

Richards blames Di Canio and Carbone for the current predicament of the Hillsborough club.

 

Wednesday are bottom of the league with only a single point from their first eight games.

 

Death knell

"The Carbone and Di Canio situations have killed us. The players are killing us and killing the game," said Richards.

 

"They come over here and take the money and it's great when everything is going their way, but when things go wrong it can be disastrous.

"I think Sheffield Wednesday have had a raw deal over the last couple of years."

 

Carbone, who is the only player to have scored for the club this season, has been involved in a series of disputes the latest of which involved him storming out of the team dressing room when he was told he would be a substitute against Southampton.

 

Shove off

Di Canio was never far from controversy during his spell at Hillsborough - such as his infamous push on referee Paul Alcock - and he was sold to West Ham as a result.

Richards, who has refused to criticise under-fire Owls boss Danny Wilson, said: "We were the ones punished for the Di Canio incident because we had to sell a player worth £6million for less than £2million.

 

"Carbone has refused to sign a contract. He is not committed to the club, but he is still collecting the wages.

 

"We have not had a single enquiry for him and we won't get a penny back on the £3.5million we paid for him when he walks away."

 

 

Glenn Hoddle: I told you so

England coach Glenn Hoddle has also entered the debate about the influx of foreign players.

 

Hoddle supports a plan to restrict the number of overseas players to five in each side throughout Europe.

 

He told The Mirror: "I remember saying when I was England coach that there would be too many foreign players in every Premiership side and ultimately it would have a grave effect on the England team.

 

"If the trend continues then it most definitely will hurt the England side in the next two or three years."