‘You can’t compete’: Club chief shares why they sold ‘outstanding’ player to Leeds this summer

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Swansea City sporting director Paul Watson felt they had to sell Joel Piroe to Leeds United this summer as they could not compete financially.

Watson was speaking in an interview with Wales Online where he was quizzed on Swansea’s decision to sell Piroe eight days before the deadline.

Leeds were chasing a move for Piroe throughout the summer but did not make their move until the penultimate week of the window.

The Whites agreed to pay an initial fee of £10.5 million that, according to Phil Hay, could potentially rise to £16 million in add-ons.

Piroe was into the final year of his deal in South Wales and had already told Swansea he would not be signing a new deal amid interest from Leeds, Southampton and Atalanta.

Watson says Swansea could not compete financially for Piroe

They had been hopeful of keeping him for the season ahead until Leeds made their move to sign a player who has been among the most prolific goalscorers in the Championship over the last two years.

Watson says that despite their desire to keep Piroe, Swansea felt they could not ‘break their structure’ to sign him onto a new deal despite how ‘outstanding’ he was since joining from PSV.

“I had a lot of conversations with Joel. I have had conversations with a lot of players. I have said there are two things I will be – I will be fair and I will be honest. We ultimately wanted to try to keep Joel but what he wanted and what his representatives wanted wasn’t within the structure of the football club.

“We felt we couldn’t break that structure because of the knock-on effect. That was coupled with an offer that came in. We had an internal valuation and that was met and exceeded in some contingents.

“When you are getting a return on an investment, he indicated that he wasn’t going to sign a new contract and you can’t compete with a club who have parachute payments, that all came to a point where you say what do we do, we get the absolute best for the football club. We can get something we can then reinvest and strengthen as we go.”

Ultimately, this does feel like a deal where all parties have been left satisfied, with Leeds getting one of the most prolific players in the division.

At the same time, Swansea have been able to make a huge profit on a player whose contract was running down, meaning they can also be happy even despite losing their best player.