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PRICHARD: Carney to Sydney is a crash-landing for the Jets

2nd February, 2016
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David Carney has been one of Newcastle's best this year, but he is off down the M1 to Sydney. (AAP Image/Dean Lewins)
Expert
2nd February, 2016
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Newcastle Jets went from wanting two Sydney FC players for David Carney, to being prepared to take one, to ending up getting none. That is the off-field equivalent of a 5-0 flogging.

Sure, Sydney FC asked a couple of their players – Andrew Hoole and Chris Naumoff – if they were prepared to be part of a switch, but it sounds like the pair couldn’t run fast enough in the opposite direction.

The deal was done even with Hoole reportedly having been offered an increase on his Sydney deal to return to his hometown club.

>> UPDATED: Sydney FC sign David Carney after Newcastle release

There are a few different interpretations you can put on what happened with the Carney matter, but whatever spin you want to apply it looks bad for the Jets.

Sydney reportedly gets a transfer fee of $300,000 to sell promising young defender Alex Gersbach overseas and within days they pick up Carney – a former Socceroo who has clearly been Newcastle’s best player this season – for nothing.

It doesn’t seem right and it certainly doesn’t seem fair to the Jets that it can happen this way, but it is allowed under the rules. It will just be another thing Football Federation Australia – Newcastle’s current owners – will have to review at the end of the season.

Newcastle didn’t want to keep Carney in the end, but they wanted to get something tangible in return for him. The fact they weren’t able to is embarrassing for the club.

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They could have played hardball and kept Carney on their books for the rest of the season, but they’ve got enough problems without hanging on to a player who didn’t want to be there.

The Jets began the season well and were comfortably in the top six early on, but they have lost seven of their last nine games and are now genuine contenders for the wooden spoon – particularly since Perth Glory are getting a wriggle on and even the Central Coast Mariners are moving forward.

Carney is a bit like a ‘carny’, the slang term traditionally used to describe travelling show employees in the United States. He’s never in the one place for long. He has had a multitude of clubs and this will be his second spell at Sydney.

It must be pointed out that Newcastle were in no rush to re-sign Carney, who is 32 and coming off contract at the end of the season. My understanding is that there had been discussions, but that they hadn’t really gone anywhere and there were no immediate indications of them picking up again.

Perhaps the Jets underestimated Carney. He had been prepared to make a move out of a club before if the scenario wasn’t favourable to him, so it shouldn’t have been a surprise that he would look towards other options in this case.

And since he was in good form, he was always likely to find alternatives.

Sydney was having its up and downs, were losing a player whose position Carney could fill and they have a busy schedule coming up with a campaign in the Asian Champions League on top of their A-League commitments.

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As soon as Newcastle coach Scott Miller declined to play Carney in last Sunday’s game against Adelaide United, you knew the end of the Jets-Carney association was nigh.

Newcastle will reportedly save about $80,000 on what would have been Carney’s remaining payments for this season and will be allowed to add that to their spending on top of the salary cap for next season.

It’s something, I guess, but obviously nothing remotely like picking up Hoole or Naumoff – or both.

Newcastle have clearly come off second-best here, but Miller can’t be worrying about that. He has to concentrate on getting the Jets to finish the season well.

Carney, meanwhile, can look forward to domestic and Asian campaigns with a much bigger club.

That’s football.

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