Daniel Feliciano

Tue 11 April 2023 18:10, UK

Leeds United have been branded as “stupid” for putting an obligation clause in their move for Jean-Kevin Augustin and then only playing him for 49 minutes.

The Whites have been ordered to pay Augustin £24.5m by FIFA for breach of contract, having already been ordered to pay RB Leipzig £15.5m in transfer fees following a disagreement over his signing stretching back from 2020.

But while discussing the case live ontalkSPORT (11 April, 11:51) reporter Alex Crook believes they “don’t have a leg to stand on” in their appeal against the ruling and said he has no sympathy for them either.

“The whole issue surrounds a technicality in my opinion,” he said. “Basically they tried to use a pandemic not to pay what they agreed to.

“So I don’t have a great deal of sympathy for Leeds in this case because they were promoted to the Premier League.

“Okay, Augustin didn’t play too big a part in that but you can’t agree to sign a player on a permanent contract subject to promotion to the Premier League and then effectively decide to renege on that because he’s not good enough and not part of your plans.

“I don’t think Leeds have got a leg to stand on in this one.”

Fellow reporter Sam Matterface also chimed in, labelling them as “stupid” for putting the clause in the contract to begin with and then not playing the player.

“They put an incentive into the contract that if they got promoted they would have to buy the player, the obligation kicked in if they got promoted. It’s nothing really to do with him, if he only plays 49 minutes.

“It seems a little bit of a stupid clause to put in.”

Ridiculous

Honestly the whole situation is a joke and Leeds have been caught out of trying to get out of the whole deal on a technicality.

Agreeing a deal with an unproven player like Augustin at that period of his career and when we weren’t a Premier League club yet was just absolutely crazy.

Now we’re likely to be a total of £40m out of pocket over this deal, for a player we never even wanted or used, and that could affect our transfer business for the coming season too.

Even worse, our Premier League status is yet to be confirmed too so being forced to pay out this amount if we are to get relegated could be a huge issue for the club financially.

It’s a horror situation but the appeal is surely just a stalling tactic at this point. We’re going to be forced to shell out this amount, so the best bet is going to be to pay it out quickly and get this situation behind us and forgotten about as soon as possible.

In other Leeds news, a £27m forward could move to Elland Road this summer after a failed approach last year.