United media officer and first team kitman Andy Hall (AH) spoke to BBC Radio Cumbria's Dan Chisholm (DC) after the news that former Blues striker Danny Graham was to sign for Swansea from Watford for £3.5million, Hall talking about what that transfer means for Carlisle financially :
DC
Can you explain in simplicity how this system all works for people who don't know?
AH
Oh, I will tell you what, it is really complicated, there aren't any two transfers that are ever the same at any level in football, let alone the Premier League, which is now getting involved with Danny Graham. But, with Danny, basically what will happen is they (Swansea) will table a bid, it has been accepted, money will swap hands and we are entitled to 15% of that after you take off the initial fee that was paid for Danny to take him to Watford in the first place.
DC
So, to put this in simple terms, if we take it back a stage, so when the player was at Carlisle United he had this clause written into his contract?
AH
Basically, what you do when you sell the player on is you negotiate terms and conditions for the future sell-on of the player as well if you are of a mind to do that, and with a player like Danny Graham certainly at the time the managing director (John Nixon) and the manager (Greg Abbott) were of a mind to do that. Because, he was a player with huge potential and as far as we were concerned he was always going to move on further.
DC
So, it is spotting the potential and then spotting the potential windfall?
AH
Absolutely that, there are occasions in the past when not just us a club, but other clubs, will have missed out because they won't have spotted that potential and they won't have negotiated sell-on clauses. So, it is an important thing that you have to make sure that you do in almost every circumstance these days.
DC
Now this is great news then for Carlisle United but do we actually really have any idea as to how much it could be worth to the club?
AH
No, and I am glad you brought that up because there is the caveat, we now have to wait and see, we are very much the same as everybody else. We can be excited for Danny definitely because he is going to play in the Premier League, we can be excited because there is the potential for a windfall. But, having said that, the best example I can give you is Rory Delap, we received the final payment of Rory's initial move to Derby County in the 90s, two years ago.
So, even though there is a fee that will come our way, it all depends on appearances, it may be linked to goals, there may be other clauses that are written in by Swansea City and by Watford, so we can't sit here and expect to receive a massive lump sum in one go. It may well be that it is over a period of time and linked to certain clauses that are put into the contract.
DC
Right, it is far more complicated than we realised isn't it? So, the notion of all fans of United thinking that this is great, rubbing their hands, the possibility of maybe a couple of players coming in, it isn't necessarily going to be the case then?
AH
It may not be, again, I have got another good example I can give you is Kevan Hurst which is a really recent one for Carlisle United fans. We took him from Scunthorpe and we announced it ourselves as a fee in the region of £140,000. Now as it was, because it was linked to appearances, we only paid Scunthorpe £80,000, and any payments that they would have had to take off that would have been based on the £80,000 that we ended up paying because Kevan didn't trigger the number of appearances that he had to trigger to cause us to pay the full amount of money for him. That will be exactly the same with Danny Graham at Watford, it will be exactly the same with every player who is making a move this summer. I would imagine that 99% of them will be linked to clauses within contracts.
DC
Crikey, so all-in-all, this is quite a complex system, I am completely amazed by what you said a moment ago, so a player that we sold years ago we have only just had the final payment in the last two years? Incredible.
AH
Yeah, just under two years ago, and that is a player who moved to Derby County and he must have had two or three clubs by then, he is at Stoke City at the moment still ploughing around in the Premier League. So, that is the kind of thing that can happen because if the triggers aren't triggered then you just don't get the payment and you end up paying or receiving the full amount that was agreed at the time.
DC
And then the other aspect of this I suppose which you sort of hinted to is because of the fact that the money will not be paid in a lump sum, it raises all sorts of questions. We don't know the financial position or state of a club like Watford which is believed to be healthy at the moment, but if the club were at some point further down the line to then run into financial difficulties, what would happen then?
AH
Again, I think it is few and far between that you get those cases where agreements or contracts aren't honoured. Because, there are always ways and means and situations where clubs are able to make sure that clubs as other creditors are serviced. So, they are few and far between that that will happen to be honest with you.
DC
Yeah, OK, but one final point on this, talking about Danny Graham the player, it seems that whilst he was a very good player at Carlisle United, there is very little doubt of the fact that he has developed into a very fine player who could actually do very well in the top flight?
AH
We felt all along that he would, he had a really long barren spell with us where he just couldn't score for love nor money. All of a sudden he just hit a run and you could see when he was on a run and when he was confident he was unstoppable. I think that is what happened at Watford, he got himself scoring goals, got himself in a team that was creating chances and situations for him to score those goals and he just went from strength to strength. So, it is absolutely no surprise that one of the top scorers in that division has moved on, and we are delighted because we know the lad really well and he is going to be really good at that level, I am convinced of it, absolutely convinced of it.
DC
Do you think £3.5 million was about right?
AH
Oooh, I would add a bit more, wouldn't you?
DC
Well, I am sure we would yeah because it would have meant more money for the club. But, it is difficult to know with valuations of footballers in the Premier League now?
AH
Well, that is a completely different monster, at that level if you are scoring goals all of a sudden you are talking who knows? You are talking silly money, and £3.5 million is silly money if we are going to be honest about it. But, probably for what Danny has done with Watford it is probably about the right level, and with other clubs interested as well it would have been interesting to see had it gone on into a bidding war for the next few weeks. But, Watford have accepted this one so now we just have to wait and see what all the nuts and bolts of the deal means to Carlisle United.