The Bristol Post highlighted the rationale here for why the Columbus Crew didn’t accept the $3.9 million offer for Zack Steffen yesterday from Bristol City.
— CREWTURE.NET (@crewture) July 20, 2018
They highlight The Massive Report’s rationalization: “With the way MLS transfer rules work, Crew SC would only keep 75 percent of the transfer fee for Steffen, or in this case $2.9 million. Of that, head coach and sporting director Gregg Berhalter can use roughly $750,000 as General Allocation Money and the remaining money can be used for investment in the club (towards a Designated Player or to improve training facilities, for example).
“Unless Berhalter and his staff believe Kempin is the present and second-year goalkeeper Logan Ketterer or rookie Ben Lundgaard are the future of the club, that would mean going out and signing another keeper in the near future. It would also mean that the rest of the money for the club would have to actually be reinvested, which — given the current possibility of relocation — seems unlikely.”
Therefore, because of Major League Soccer’s Godfather system where Major League Soccer/Don Garber (fittingly @thesoccerdon on twitter) gets a little of everything that is one main reason why the Columbus Crew and Sporting Director/Manager Gregg Berhalter couldn’t say “yes.”
Berhalter tries to do what is best for Crew players, even when it’s difficult for Columbus, most of the time (see Justin Meram or Ola Kamara in recent history). Yet there is no reason to think a bidding war for US soccer’s next big keeper would be a bad thing for the Crew or Steffen.
If $3.9 million is acceptable then there is no reason to think why $7.8 million couldn’t be more acceptable.
Columbus went back to the drawing board multiple times themselves in their own offers for Milton Valenzuela and for others that didn’t occur such as Jhon Murillo, Lucas Gamba.
Bristol City, who currently has Max O’Leary (who was on loan as keeper at Solihull Moors in the English 5th Division last season) and Frank Fielding (currently injured and who isn’t likely a number one that can propel them to Premier League level anyways) probably foresaw a first offer being rejected.
Bristol City also has Niki Maenpaa, but the 33 year old Finnish keeper has only made 11 appearances with the club since 2015.
With two weeks until their English Championship season begins the Robins therefore may have a second offer for Zack Steffen in them.
However, even if Bristol City does gain Steffen’s signature eventually, the club may still have to loan Zack to Columbus for the rest of the 2018 season (or loan him somewhere else) until they can gain a work permit for him.
As I wrote in my initial story, something to keep in mind if Crew, Bristol and Steffen agree to deal: It'll be very hard for him to get an English work permit.
If the transfer goes through, there's potential he'll be loaned by Bristol (perhaps to Crew) until he can get a permit.
— Sam Stejskal (@samstejskal) July 19, 2018
Vital Football Bristol City has a more in-depth look at the work permit issues.
Nevertheless, I’m guessing the Robins have completed their hedonistic calculus before making any offer to the Crew.
Bristol City likely doesn’t figure it will be complicated to eventually win an appeal on a work permit for Steffen as the Crew keeper appears on track to be the sole benefactor, participating in the majority of goalkeeper caps for the United States in the next two years.
I doubt this will work for the English courts , but who knows.
Regardless of what Bristol City does… I’m beginning to think Berhalter has foreseen this through his looking glass into the future.
As was personally a bit perplexed on draft day when Columbus selected Ben Lundgaard as our third goalkeeper behind Zack Steffen.
Was in the building and thought “why? what’s the point of that as a number one pick?” as no one is starting over Steffen.
Lundgaard was a nice guy though.
Well, now everything makes a bit more sense.
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