I did everything I could to persuade Birmingham to let me leave and in the end, I had to hand in a written transfer request, which destroyed my relationship with Steve Bruce.

I talk about it in my new autobiography (serialised on MirrorFootball and in the Daily Mirror from next Monday) and it wasn’t the nicest of times I’ve ever had.

Why player power means Mascherano will get his move, just like I did

By Robbie Savage

Published 23:03 29/07/10

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I look at Javier Mascherano at Liverpool and I was in a similar situation at Birmingham.

I wasn’t on the same level as him as a player, but I was as popular at Birmingham at the time as he is at Liverpool.

I did everything I could to persuade Birmingham to let me leave and in the end, I had to hand in a written transfer request, which destroyed my relationship with Steve Bruce.

I talk about it in my new autobiography (serialised on MirrorFootball and in the Daily Mirror from next Monday) and it wasn’t the nicest of times I’ve ever had.

I eventually got my move and Mascherano will get his because it’s all about player power now.

If you want to leave a football club, you can, and it doesn’t matter if you are on £5,000-a-week or £50,000-a-week. That’s just the way it is.

People may say he signed a contract and he should honour it, but contracts aren’t worth the paper they are written on.

I had signed a four-year deal at Birmingham and I left three months into it.

The issue for me is that players are treated differently to managers when they say they want to go.

I know players are the most pampered human beings on the planet. We don’t know the meaning of the word no and like everything our own way.

But when a manager says he wants to leave to join another club, he just leaves.

The club can’t do much about it, apart from put him on gardening leave, and even then he still goes on to manage that new club anyway.

But when a player says he wants to go, they are accused of being disloyal and there can be a backlash from the fans.

I think it should cut both ways and players should be treated the same as managers.

I think Mascherano, as good as he is, is replaceable. I know he does a great job for Liverpool and is the captain of Argentina, but for me, if Liverpool could get £20million for him, I’d take it.

I’d use the money to buy a world-class centre-forward and I think that’s one area where Liverpool are weak.

They don’t have a lot of cover if Fernando Torres is injured and that was shown up last season.

I like Milan Jovanovic and I think Joe Cole is a great signing, but I still think they need another goalscorer.

Roy Hodgson should sell Mascherano for £20million if he can get it and spend the money on a striker.