McLean turns up the heat

Peterborough chairman Darragh MacAnthony knows a thing or two about playing hardball.

But I'm not so sure he thought Aaron McLean would ever play him at his own game.

The gentleman's agreement that the two had regarding Posh not standing in the players way should a Premiership club come calling for the him now seems to be in tatters, ripped apart by MacAnthony's £5m valuation that Wolves, or anyone else for that matter are highly unlikely to match.

McLean would appear to to believe that included sides with strong Premiership aspirations while MacAnthony obviously saw multi million pound signs when he made the original offer.

Aaron has joined the rest of the Peterborough squad in Marbella as part of their pre season build up, but all is not well in the Posh camp.

McLean having asked for a new contract, his agent has laughed at Posh's offer of a club record new deal, with the two parties now heading for a mexican standoff.

It doesn't do any side any good to have an unhappy player on their hands, and MacAnthony can say McLean's head is 'all over the place' as much as he wants, that is not the problem.

The problem is with a belligerent chairman and an outspoken manager standing in the way of a player who fired them to promotion last season who wants to now move on.

If I had to draw up a list of managers tactful enough to handle a want away player, I'd be several pages down the list before I got to Barry Fry.

No offence Barry, but you just don't come across as that kind of guy.

The best resolution for all parties involved would be a sensible valuation as a starting point for negotiations, but there are no signs that MacAnthony or Fry are prepared to leave their alternate reality that prices their striker equal to what it cost Rangers to aquire both Kyle Lafferty and Kenny Miller.

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