Preston manager Billy Davies has angered Dario Gradi by going public over his attempts to sign Steve Jones.
The Northern Ireland international is out of contract at the end of the season and Preston aren’t willing to pay cash, they have offered a player swop instead.
‘He (Davies) hasn’t got any money,’ said Gradi. ‘All he’s done is come up with nonsense. He’s spoken to everybody else, but he hasn’t spoken to me.
‘They want to know if we are interested in a player exchange, but I haven’t returned the calls. He’s no business talking to the Press about what he’s done.’
‘We have offered Steve a very good contract and nothing has changed on that at the moment,’ he said. ‘So we will have to wait and see what happens when the January transfer window reopens, but we are certainly not interested in what Preston have to offer.’
Preston manager Davies said: ‘He is a player we admire and a player we like. We’ve made phone calls over him.’
As far as [Crewe manager] Dario [Gradi] being annoyed I can understand where he is coming from but my conscience is clear and I can only put it down to bad journalism. I can confirm that we did make an enquiry about Jones, however that’s as far as it went. As far as I’m concerned it was an enquiry and nothing more.”
No doubt this is going to run and run.
