If you’ve followed the professional soccer world at all in the last decade, you’ll be fully aware that some of them are on outrageous money. John Nicholson advocates a move away from huge set wages to a performance-related scheme, and the man speaks the truth:

A player’s agent will be quick to ask for more money for his player after one good season – but if he has a bad season will not expect his wages to drop.

The time has come to change this.

We need a large element of their wages to be performance-related and on top of that if you’re injured, your money must be cut radically. Players can easily insure their income to cover themselves for periods of lay-off – it should not be a burden the club has to bear. Players expect win bonuses but not loss reductions. Why not? That’s just having your cake and cramming it in your gob, son.

After much humming and speculation, Robbie Keane has signed for Liverpool. Will he go on to leave a legacy on a par with the likes of John Aldridge? We shall see. I hope so. Seven years after his move to Inter Milan went sour I think this will be his last chance to prove he can make it at the highest level (even if Liverpool have been reasonably poor over the last few seasons). Playing alongside the likes of Fernando Torres will do him, and by extension the Irish team, a world of good.