Mendieta

Almost forgot, after his retirement he played a masters tournament I was lucky enough to attend. Comfortably the best player on display that night, gliding around the pitch and taking the P out of every other player, including Mickey Gray who was still playing for Blackburn at the time.
 
He may have been good in the reserves but he wasn't very good in the premier League at that point.
I don't think there were any extra payments kicking in. Neither Mendieta nor Southgate have mentioned it. I'd imagine they just didn't want a high wage player who wasn't up to it.
Matthew bates didn't play while Mendieta was at the club he had left by then.
 
Sheriff_John_Bunnell_ret said:
He may have been good in the reserves but he wasn't very good in the premier League at that point.
I don't think there were any extra payments kicking in. Neither Mendieta nor Southgate have mentioned it. I'd imagine they just didn't want a high wage player who wasn't up to it.
Matthew bates didn't play while Mendieta was at the club he had left by then.
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Correct. Matty Bates played mainly in the relegation season, Mendieta had already left.

We let Rochemback, Boateng and Cattermole all leave and Mendieta retired at the end of 07/08. We replaced them with Digard and Rhys Williams who was re-integrated back into the squad as a CM.
We also replaced James Morrison with Gary O'Neill the season previously. It's no wonder we were relegated. Absolutely terrible business.

Back to Mendieta. He struggled to get in the team in front of Rochemback/Cattermole in the CM position alongside Boateng. James Morrison and Gary O'Neill were playing on the right in front of him.
He must have been on massive wages since we got him on a free. He had been class in Spain earlier in his career but we never got that player at Boro. He was pretty average for most of his time with us and will have cost us a fortune in wages.
 
He was most definitely in a contractual situation with the club which affected his selection.

He had offers to go to Spain on loan but preferred to stay and fight for his place.

Often the best player in training and wasn’t even granted a spot on the bench to avoid the potential for us needing a player in midfield and him being overlooked.
 
Big_Nothing said:
He was most definitely in a contractual situation with the club which affected his selection.

He had offers to go to Spain on loan but preferred to stay and fight for his place.

Often the best player in training and wasn’t even granted a spot on the bench to avoid the potential for us needing a player in midfield and him being overlooked.
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Phil Stamp and Carlos Marinelli, by all accounts, are two of the best players we've ever had in training. Doesn't mean a lot. Mendieta was good in his first season (good, but not great) and pretty rubbish afterwards, in the first team anyway. I criticised Southgate for a lot of things, but not this.
 
People talk **** about Mendieta all the time - saying things like he only had 5 good games - but he was sublime at times.

The intelligence, experience and sheer quality of him, Juninho and Zenden in the middle was the key to us winning the Carling Cup. As others said, that 4-1 performance against Man U, he was out of this world.

Will always be one of my favourites. One of the highest quality footballers we’ve ever had, along with TLF, Boksic and Southgate imho.
 
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