Murray moves for £300K

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Rochdale AFC have accepted an offer of £300,000 from Brighton and Hove Albion for their top scorer, Glenn Murray. The striker travelled to the south coast on Thursday 24 January and signed a three and a half year deal today (Friday 25 January) after completing a medical.

24-year-old Murray was brought to Rochdale, initially on loan from hometown club Carlisle United on 20 October 2006. He made the switch permanent for an undisclosed fee in the January transfer window last year. Averaging virtually a goal every two starts he made a total of 60 appearances in a Dale shirt scoring 26 goals, the last of which was his solo effort in the 4-3 win at Chesterfield.

Chairman Chris Dunphy, though sad to see the clubs leading scorer leave, said that the offer was simply too good to refuse and was at pains to point out the need for financial stability.

"You can do one of two things. You can struggle to survive or set a budget where you know that at some time you are going to have to balance the books and that is what we have done with the sale of Glenn.

"We have supported the manager and his team from day one in terms of sports science, diet, extra staff and a pre-season trip. It has paid off in many ways. All this comes at a cost and when you have got a deficit in the budget and an offer like this comes along then it has to be taken. The alternative to that is clubs that go into receivership with their supporters shaking buckets outside the ground and that is not going to happen on my watch.

"It is a good offer, a sensible offer and there will be some of it made available for the management team to continue their rebuilding."