eple

I'm having a difficult time trying to get rid of established players (older than 25 years) and I'm wondering if this is happening to everyone else, or if it's just my players. I get tons of bids for young, promising and not so promising players, but with some of the older players I can't even give them away. I thought it was going to be easier in FM08, but so far it seem harder. The general answers as to why the clubs interested won't make an offer when I offer the players to them is that the asking price is too high, the player is unlikely to be interested or that the clubs doesn't need a player in that position. All these replies makes me wonder why they are interested in the player in the first place.

My general method of selling players is listing them for a reasonable price, setting squad status to not needed, then try to offer them to clubs. If no one is interested or willing to bid, I lower the asking price until it's 0, which will generally get clubs interested, but it doesn't seem to help much.

I'm Villa and the some of players I've tried to get rid of is as follows:

John Carew - Didn't play well and tried to sell him shortly before then end of the first window. Tried again and again offering him to clubs, setting his value to 0 to attract interest. No bites despite 11 clubs being interested at one point. In january I finally got bids, but it was only loan with salary payments from 0-40%. Eventually sold him for £1m on 24 months installment the next season. He was originally valued at over £4mn, but it dropped when I listed him. It continued dropping and was £2.3m when he left.

Stilian Petrov - Didn't impress the first part of the season. Tried to sell him in jaunary, but couldn't give him away for free. Again I got lots of loan offers though, with low wage payments. Agree a deal with Torino (the club who loaned him) the next summer for £150k, but he rejected the contract and is now out on loan again. Value was above £4m, but dropped to about £2.5m in 8 months.

Thomas Sørensen - Tried selling him for over a year until Spurs took the bate and bought him for £250k (value at the time £2.5mn). Got no bids even when I tried to give him away, but when I made a bid on Spurs left back Bale, they suddenly became interest in him.

Stuart Taylor - No interest whatsoever, not even loans.

Wilfred Bouma - Over 10 clubs interested, but only Racing Santander made a money bid, which Bouma rejected because of the standard of the the poor training facilities (they were average). Eventually joined Fulham on loan. Value at the time I listed him was £3.5m, but dropped to £2.8m in a couple of weeks.

Marlon Harewood - No interest, couldn't even give him away. Understandably perhaps, as he is poor, but very frustrating. Surly most championship clubs would jump at the chance of getting him on the cheap. I evntually gave up and removed him from the transfer list, and a short while after he requested a transfer and then finally agreed a mutual termination of around £500k.

Patrick Berger - No interest. Eventually sacked him.

Am I doing something wrong, or is hard for everybody else as well? Or are these players just not good enough?