'I did my job': Simon Jordan clashes with ex-agent of Bobby Duncan over career demise since Liverpool blow-up | OneFootball

Former Crystal Palace chairman Simon Jordan has revisited Bobby Duncan's departure from Liverpool with his agent at the time, Salif Rubie.

Duncan has moved to Spanish Third Division Real Balompedica Linense this season.

Jordan and Rubie clashed this morning on Jim White's talkSPORT show about Duncan's career progress:

Saif Rubie: “Can I tell you something in that particular case? I actually advised him to stay at Liverpool and you have to understand one thing, which is what I was trying to tell you guys, my job is to do the best for whoever is telling me to help them whether it be the player, a buying club or a selling club. In that particular case, you can choose to believe me or not, I thought him staying was the best outcome. It wasn't meant to be and in the end it got a bit ugly with Liverpool which is unfortunate."

Jim White: “Bobby Duncan might've been better advised to get a different intermediary."

Simon Jordan: “You're in the business of moving players around and giving them an opportunity. I'd give you an example and contradict your view of what football clubs do and don't think.

“You've moved a player, the player is no longer an interest in you because this player's of no commercial interest because the player has gone the way it's gone. I had a player at Crystal Palace called John Bostock who was loved and adored by this football club.

“I spent a lot of time with a 15-year-old, 16-year-old boy, a lot more than a chairman should in terms of trying to convince him that his future at Crystal Palace. What he had was someone like you in his ear that created a different set of outlooks and went to Tottenham and flushed it.

“Now we have a boy who had all the opportunities in the world and the people around him at the time are no longer there because he's no longer of any use to them anymore.

“It would seem that situation manifested itself with Bobby Duncan because the outcome is this, you're there telling him what the challenges has got, falling out with Liverpool Football Club creating nothing but ill-will and the boys' career now, everyone's going to get an outcome, you're going to get an outcome that's for damn sure however a deal gets done you get the outcome.

“The consequences are human consequences because he gets no benefit out of it whatsoever and you're in the middle of this."

SR: “Nobody and this is what I'm trying to tell you. The problem with football clubs when they have assets for whatever reason aren't happy where they are, they seem to be more often than not keeping hold of them for dear life. I'm in the business of football."

JW: “What good did this do for Duncan?"

SR: “It was the truth [the tweet he sent about Liverpool's treatment with Bobby Duncan]."

JW: “You accused Liverpool of bullying and mentally destroying Duncan?"

SR: “I said that because it's the truth."

JW: “Did you say that on Twitter?"

SR: “I don't like to talk dirty laundry out in the public because at the end of the day, what went on behind the scenes at the time, you mentioned Michael Edwards there Simon, I can't tell you the reason…"

JW: “For those who don't know, Saif caused controversy in 2019 around this lad Bobby Duncan at Liverpool and you accused the club of 'bullying and mentally destroying Duncan' days before a move was sealed to Fiorentina - a three-year deal.

“You were critical on Twitter of the Liverpool board and you claim Duncan quotes 'will never go back to Liverpool again, my only concern now is his mental health and wellbeing' and now he's in the third tier of Spanish football."

SR: “That outcome [third tier of Spanish football] is nothing to do with me. I did my job."

SJ: “But the outcome of the player is the third tier of Spanish football."

SR: “Like I said, the point is the player was a young player who was unhappy there and wanted to leave. At the time, as I've told you, I was tasked with working with the player."

SJ: “Which is their gift, yeah?"

SR: “They didn't want to let him go out on loan to play first-team football."

SJ: “If they didn't want to give him a contract he'd be out of contract, wouldn't he?"

SR: “Let me tell you on that situation because to be honest, I don't want to, at the time we agreed to disagree, but the reality is for whatever reason Liverpool didn't want to let the player go out on loan to play first-team football. They didn't want to give him a contract, they didn't want to let him know. Basically, I don't know what it was."

SJ: “You make this same observation and I don't care either which way whether you did or didn't but you made the same observation about Michael Edwards and that all he did was be a data analyst and have no understanding other than that.

“You take a player out at Liverpool [Bobby Duncan] and not you because you're no longer there, now in the third tier of Spanish football. With your advice and guidance, the player you looked after, Bobby Duncan, has gone where?"

SR: “He can be a genius but everyone in life at a particular moment in time can make a particular decision that may not be seen in the same way.

“Like I said, I don't want to go in the past too much but at that moment in time, Liverpool did not want to let this player leave at any cost because they didn't even let him out on loan to prove himself as a first-team player if that was what he wanted to do."