David Sullivan doesn’t want Andy Carroll to go to the Euros or any of our players “to go and play for England.”
The co chairman – made his position clear towards the end of a talkSPORT interview in which he defended the Olympic Stadium deal struck by the Irons.
Asked whether he believed Carroll should go to France he said: “I know it’s a horrible thing to say but I don’t want any of our players to go and play for England.
“I saw what happened to Dean Ashton. We lost a vital player and we never got a penny compensation from the FA.”
And he explained: “For me as a club owner when they go away, they play extra games and they risk injury. It does nothing for me.
“If you want to sell it probably increase their value but we have no desire to sell any of our players. Wearing my West Ham United hat I wish we had no internationals and a nice long break.
“That’s because often players involved in these big competitions struggle the next season because they don’t get a long enough break in the summer.”
None of our players are going to be called up for England and that suits me fine, let them rest for a few weeks and come back ready for a massive historical season in August…
I understand David is looking at it from the point of view of our players being business commodities. He offsets the profit against the loss. The profit being an increase in the players value. The loss being the possibilities of injury but I believe this is a horrible way of looking at it and he knows it is when he says it. Very negative opinion. Dean Ashton was a one off exceptional case. Yes Deano got injured training with England but could just as easily have been training with West Ham when it happened. Footballers are footballers. You can’t stop them from playing football or wrap them in cotton wool. Every English West Ham fan should want West Ham players playing for England. Would David Sullivan have preferred Bobby Moore not to play for England in the 66 World Cup in case he got injured? How about Martin peters? Geoff hurst? Trevor Brooking? Alan Devonshire?
I am sure it’s the AC situation that worries him and all of us,
Payet will go,Randolf,Ginge,
Wonder if we will loose people to the Olympics,Lanzini must have a chance,
More interesting is who will be joining us and how early our new European journey will start
Once upon a time I believe it was a players’ aspiration to play for their nation and it meant something, and for some nations that’s still the case. But I don’t believe that in England all the players have that aspiration, it’s another pay day.
However, players going to internationals and playing with other quality players in training and a team potentially makes them a better player also. I agree that there are too many pointless international friendlies – they should be limited and the focus placed on the qualifiers and tournaments.
All I will say is fans can’t have it both ways.Can’t whinge when our players don’t get picked but then whinge & worry when they are on international duty scared about them being tired or getting injured 😀 😀