Peterborough United chairman explains why he rejected club captain Oliver Norburn’s desire to leave after just five months at London Road

Norburn, who only joined Posh from Shrewsbury in August, wanted to move nearer to his family home in Bolton after his wife and young child failed to settle in Peterborough.

Blackpool saw a bid rejected for Norburn last week and another bid made three hours before the transfer window closed today (January 31) was also rebuffed.

MacAnthony explained: “I spoke to Ollie myself on Saturday when I heard he wasn’t available for the game (against Sheffield United) as he had a dead leg or something.

“Everything had come up with the bids from Blackpool and then the story got leaked about wanting to move home. I don’t know where the story came from.

“We’re trying to play a game on Saturday and this is going on, so it’s not ideal.

“I spoke to him man-to-man on the phone and he explained the situation of wanting to move home. I get it, I’m a family guy. I haven’t seen my own kids or my wife for five weeks.

“I told him there’s 120 days until June and his job is to keep us in the Championship like every other player at the club.

“While I understand about the family situation, I have over 200 employees with their own families and there are careers on the line depending on whether we stay in the Championship or drop into League One.

“I told him he has my word and we will work with him having more time at home and give us your best shot to keep us in the Championship.

“If it’s mission accomplished, I’ll do my best to get him a good move in June, which was my agreement with him. But that was then.

“Today, another offer came in three hours before the deadline and we told Blackpool ‘no, it’s not happening’. We left it at that because we wouldn’t have had time to get a replacement anyway.

“We wanted to keep him, the manager wants to keep him and it was his decision. The player is going to be disappointed, I get it, but there’s 120 days and 19 league games left. We paid a lot of money in the summer and we expect professionalism until the end of the season. He’s the type of character to give it his all. He was never going to leave.”