Hoarau opts for lucrative contract in China

Even Jean Michel Jarre is confused!

I would prefer Gameiro or Vossen.

If this bloke chooses money over potentially the best football of his career, then we've had a lucky escape.

He'll win his fair share of headers in China.

'Hoarau... Is it me you're looking for?'

By the time he's finished running the channels he wouldn't have the energy to get into the box.

These rumours need to pick up the pace as all our reported signings are disappearing.

It's not as if fans didn't already know this, but there are so many players who have very little passion for the game and just play for money. (In the book, he actually says he's lost count the amount of players who have said, "If I could earn the same amount of money doing something else, then I would.")

Unfortunately, their ambition is to simply make as much money as possible and not play at the highest level. It won't be long until some of these leagues like China and Russia are full of players who could do decent jobs in the top European leagues but simply don't care.

I think it highly unlikely that people just fall into a career in football, somehow just finding themselves on the pitch with a contract in their back pocket. It is not as though they are advertising it down the job centre.

I can, however, imagine exacting fitness regimes, tightly controlled diets and high pressure expectation overwhelming the simple pleasure of the game.

The thing is Hourau would have still been highly paid and feted at a club like Everton, just not as highly paid as he will be in China. He has gone for lots more money than he will ever really need (in a culture that he will never really settle in) rather than just more money than he will ever really need and terminated his career at the highest level in the process.

I asked them outright if they regretted being in the game at a different time, when the money wasn't what it is now. They both said no. I called them a pair of lying so-and-so's, and we moved on.

Yesterday Demba Ba left Newcastle and joined Chelsea for a signing on fee that eclipsed what these guys earned in their entire top-flight career.

The wages are out of control now, and we can all speculate as to which clubs or personalities are at fault for that.

The sad fact is, that last year a youth player at a top flight club allegedly got caught up in racing his high-spec car, had an accident, and will face trial accused of causing the deaths of two people. A teenage millionaire who's never kicked a ball for his first team.

Bet he never scrubbed the boots of the first team either? You know, like the pros of old had to as apprentices.

I can well believe that kicking a ball is a chore for some of these kids, having a D-list celebrity squeeze is far, far more pressing and potentially lucrative.

Many people start careers with enthusiasm and interest, only to find out that that the enjoyment gets buried beneath the drudgery of the routine. I am sure professional footballers get pumped-up and will enjoy good performances, but maybe we shouldn't be surprised that some of them think the 'grass is greener on the other side'. If the old pro's don't fancy the current regimes then it becomes more understandable.

To me there is an acceptable level of 'mercenariness' but Hoarau has exceeded that.

Unfortunately, I don't think football is exclusive in its ability to convince people they are special when they are actually very far from it (or yet to prove it). Side effect of a celebrity obsessed culture?