Chief executive Simon Clegg says Town plan to offer midfielder Lee Martin a new contract this summer. The 25-year-old, who has said he’s keen to stay with Town and wants his future sorted sooner rather than later, has a year remaining on his current deal.

Clegg says he intends to approach the former Manchester United man with new terms, probably a three-year deal, during the close season: “Certainly, that’s the plan.”

Asked whether Andy Drury or any of the other players whose contracts are up in the summer of 2013 will also be offered new deals, the Town chief says these things are taken care of as a matter of course: “People out there think that suddenly we get to the end of the season and say ‘crikey, look who’s out of contract’.

“We are constantly on top of these things. The fans might not see that we are because quite frankly I don’t want to put it into the public domain who we’re speaking to and when.”

Along with Martin and Drury, Jimmy Bullard, Damien Delaney, Nathan Ellington, Arran Lee-Barrett, Jaime Peters, Ryan Stevenson, Joe Whight and Cormac Burke all have contracts which are up at the end of June 2013, while skipper Carlos Edwards and Luke Hyam recently signed new one-year contracts.

Over the last couple of years the Blues have lost big money signings David Norris (£2 million), Gareth McAuley (£1.1 million) and now Grant Leadbitter (£2.65 million) on Bosman free transfers after they turned down new contracts, a situation manager Paul Jewell says he doesn’t want replicated next summer and will look to sell players who are unwilling to commit to new terms. Norris joined Portsmouth, McAuley West Brom, while Leadbitter is believed to be on his way to Middlesbrough.

Clegg says that the other side of the coin is the significant cost of keeping those players, particularly with the Financial Fair Play rules coming in next season: “You also have to consider the implications of keeping some of those players on in terms of wages.

“There is a significant change to the wage structure and David Norris probably wishes he was still at Ipswich and had accepted the two-year offer he was made, but he was desperate for a three-year offer. Who’s lost out now?”

As for Leadbitter, who revealed his intention to leave the Blues at the end of his contract a week ago, Clegg says there were tentative talks about a new deal last summer: “We had some discussions but the bottom line is that he’s moved on. I’m grateful for the contribution that he’s made to the club.

“As Paul said, he’s a great pro and I’m sure that he will find a contract elsewhere. I’m sure that he has something lined up.”

Clegg points out that the Blues are far from the only Championship club to have seen players leave for free at the end of the contracts in the last couple of seasons: “Whilst people were giving us a hard time about Chuck and Gareth, I think people were quite surprised to see how many players were out of contract and were let out of contract by their clubs last summer. This is becoming much more the norm these days.

“Clubs aren’t committing to the longer term deals they were a few years ago because if it doesn’t work out, you’ve got to pay them off and it costs you a lot of money.”

Photo: Action Images

slowerball added 20:21 - May 4 “There is a significant change to the wage structure and David Norris probably wishes he was still at Ipswich and had accepted the two-year offer he was made, but he was desperate for a three-year offer. Who's lost out now?” Quality - credit where it is due.
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slowerball added 20:29 - May 4 Blue041273 - in response to your question: No. I never rated Norris. To be fair to him, there was talk of him coming for a long, long time. He then dithered on signing, he then had injury issues so when he did start playing, eventually - I think he took time to settle in. Then, unluckily for him, the expectations were always too high for him to achieve. For me he didn't get his foot in enough, wasn't the passer we could have done with and bar an all too brief good run, didn't score enough goals. I'm not knocking him for going - he is a professional player and needed to do what (he thought) was best for him and his family. But I did knock him at the time I'm afraid - he ran round a lot but I never rated him and think the club did right in not being held to ransom. I would also suggest that Jimmy Bullard is a far better player - one whom we need to see the best of again, from game one next season one hopes.

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Sindre94 added 21:02 - May 4 Sign him up
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walberswick added 21:11 - May 4 Norris will be fine, he's just waiting for a dopey but desperate manager to sign him up. Another signing on fee and a couple more years of contract.
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Blue041273 added 22:03 - May 4 Slowerball, I respect your point of view. In his time with us Norris divided opinion on here. But my point was really related to the length of contract on offer. Why was 2 years considered appropriate while 3 years was a deal buster? Bullard may well be the better player but we have already lost a year on his 2 year deal. The club is now going into the last year of the contract. At this point are we going to renew now? I thought not. As I see it, if a player gets to the last year of a lucrative contract there will be no incentive to renew unless the terms are at least as good as the existing deal. At the same time the transfer value during the last year of the contract will be zilch, not least because the player might as well wait until the expiry of the contract and pick up the transfer fee as a signing on fee from the new club for himself. Thus the better players need to be on longer contracts and if we are looking to retain their services the renewal negotiations need to start 18 - 24 months before they expire.

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BuckieBlue added 22:38 - May 4 Report says he wants to stay so hopefully he & his agent will know money is tight at all(?) championship clubs and will accept a reasonable, albeit reduced offer. Also let's give management their due- learning from past mistakes?
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walberswick added 22:41 - May 4 anyone fancy a sweep for the person to guess when PJ actually signs his first player?
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Tractastic added 23:14 - May 4 Good, Lee has done really well this season despite the public ridiculing early in the season from Mr Jewell? Would Ferguson or Wenger done this ? Shame we can't support our younger players with similar support/contracts (Hyam,Bennett) but not surprised as the chuckle brothers are still running the club. It will be interesting to see this summer who wants to play for Jewell and Clegg? Reckon Chopra and Bullard will be first to voice support. Thanks for the great contracts..hick....shambles.

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SheffieldBlue1 added 02:17 - May 5 As long as the economic side is viable and he isn't just trying to push for inflated wages after a half decent season I see no problem with this. Will definitely be a key player for us next season, hopefully in that role just behind the striker in a 4-4-1-1 where he looks particularly effective and he looks like he actually wants to play for us (take a cursory glance at Norris, Leadbitter etc) The sheer thought of Norris looking dolefully at the championship table next season whilst sifting through his 'IOUs' for wages from Pompey to find his bus fare still makes me giggle, giggling with added mirth.

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bluecreations added 10:08 - May 5 100 days to go, and counting. Olympics will be over and hopefully Evans wont need Clegg anymore and we can get a proper chief executive in.
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