In these financial times, clubs everywhere are cutting their cloths. The end of the season is usually marked by clubs up and down the country - from the top of the SPL to the bottom of the third division - announcing on their websites which players are being freed and which are being offered new contracts. It is so difficult to find a club these days that the vast majority of those offered contracts will grab them. Those that don't will do so because they either have another offer or know there is an extremely good chance they can find alternative employment elsewhere. That's what happened to Saints players Paul Gallacher and Michael Higdon, and good luck to them.
However, there are some that turn down the new offer because they think they can do better elsewhere. Hugh Murray made that mistake in 2002 and quickly came back with his tale between his legs - and that was in the boom times of the Football League in England. Which makes Jure Travner's decision to turn down an offer to extend his stay at Greenhill Road seem all the more bizarre.
Now, it is possible that the Slovenian has decided to return home after a year with Watford followed by a year in Paisley. It's also possible that he has found a new club and I'm not aware of it, but a quick search of Wikipedia, Facebook, Google and Twitter (never let it be said Mirren Mad doesn't do its research) shows him as still being without a club. Let's assume that is the case.
Had Jure signed the contract he had been offered to remain a Buddie, it would have kicked on from June 1. If we are to assume he would be paid £500 a week (which I feel is a conservatively low estimate), he his missed out on over £4,000 since then (ignoring the issue of tax). That's a sizeable chunk of any footballer's income when they are at a club like St Mirren. Of course, if he ends up on wages of double that somewhere then he'll more than make up for that, but at the moment he must be kicking himself.
It's not just the money side of things either. Travner has missed out on a whole pre-season and with each passing week will be falling deeper into the memory banks of the various managers he would have been hoping would offer him a contract.
Please do not think this is a campaign to get Travner re-signed - it's not. We have no need of another leftback and his replacement Jeroen Tesselaar has done a good job so far and actually seems able to defend, something Jure struggled with. I am merely highlighting the fact that a player who did a more than capable job in the SPL was offered a new contract, turned it down and is still (I believe) looking for a new club more than two months later.
This should be a lesson to footballers everywhere. Do not automatically assume you can get a better gig with ease. Once you walk away, you become one of the hundreds of other footballers battling it out for one of the few spaces available at clubs these days. A problem that Craig Dargo and Paddy Cregg, the other two players that left at the end of last summer after being released that are still looking for new clubs, can relate to.
Just remember folks, the grass isn't always greener elsewhere.
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