Alan Hardy's actually going into some depth about the reasons on his Twitter feed, in response to the understandable disappointment of the fans. In summary, player wanted to go and it was either take the deal on the table (very good one according to Alan, as above) or risk getting fleeced at the tribunal. The difference these days is that the players, and more importantly the agents, hold the whip hand to a much greater degree than in the days of Johnson and Draper.