Bowyer set to leave Charlton after contract talks fail

Charlton Athletic could be set to lose their manager this summer.

Lee Bower, who helped the club to the Championship through the League One playoffs, is set to depart the club.

Bowyer has failed to agree a new contract, per the London Evening Standard.

Charlton have already put out a statement saying Bowyer was offered a contract that he refused to sign.

It appears Bowyer wanted a much higher salary and a longer contract term, which Charlton are not in a position to currently offer.

"The fact the club is for sale has not helped with finding an agreement," Charlton's announcement read.

"The current owner needs to take into account that a new owner may want to appoint his own manager.

"However, this concern did not stop the current owner proposing a contract extension of one year to Lee Bowyer, even though the club may be sold in a few weeks.

"Under those circumstances a multi-year extension would not be good business practice.

"In addition, since the club is still losing money, which is one of the reasons why the club has not been sold yet, the focus on reducing costs means that we are extremely limited on payroll increases.

"Lee has been offered a one-year extension to his contract at a level which is approximately three times what he had since his last increase when he became permanent manager in September.

"It is six times what he earned when he started as assistant manager in 2017 and 50% more than what any Charlton manager previously had (excluding the Premier League years).

"This reflects the strong desire we have to continue to have Lee as our manager. But Lee wanted much more.

"The owner understands Lee's point of view, because many Championship clubs pay huge amounts (some pay millions of £ per year) to their manager.

"It is fair that Lee feels he should be paid like many other Championship managers. That the average Championship club makes a loss of around £15 million per year is not something players should care about. The owners are crazy.

"This is why we could not come to an agreement. Another element may have influenced as well. Unlike previous contract discussions, Lee wanted an agent to handle it.

"We reluctantly accepted. However, involving a player agent in a manager's contract discussion is not healthy.

"If the agent helps make the manager more money, it may result in the manager to have a more positive attitude towards players proposed by the same agent, a conflict of interest.

"Obviously, Lee is above such things, but it is nevertheless not a healthy situation."