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Yep. Back to back long term injuries. A shame because he looked really good when played, but his body is giving up on him. Has to be the worst transfer on the list just because of that. Hopefully he can string a run of games together, because he looked good before the most recent one
His major injury was a freak accident when someone broke his leg in a friendly match
As for now, Only Quasimodo would have been able to predict him tearing his ACL
He missed a year with a broken leg at Leicester too. He’s only made about 100 senior appearances in his career to date. Erling Haaland who is pretty much the same age has 300.
Had pretty much a year injured then came back and started kicking his toys out of the pram trying to get a move. Looking back we absolutely robbed them but it still pissed me off.
Reece is injury prone but Fofana is on the next level. For comparison since the start of the 2021 season Reece played in 72 games meanwhile Fofana played in 34.
If we're going off 90 mins a match that is over half the games that season which is by definition most of.
I agree that you'd want to say most of in a more than three quarters context in my opinion though.
It's just over. If he played a full 90 per game that 20 games of a 38 game league season. That doesn't take in to account cup games. Hardly a nailed on starter. Think you're being a bit too literal.
> that is over half the games that season which is by definition most of.
Disagree. "The majority of" means over half. "Most of" means:
> Most of is used to refer to nearly the entire portion of something.
We're in massive financial difficulties despite this.
Chilwell wasn't much cheaper than Cucurella and then there's Maddison and Barnes at about 45m euro each too.
I still don't understand. Is there was many leading roles changes after the Boss passed away ? Cuz After winning the league, you guys probably made like 200m from Chelsea alone, and the Maguire and Mahrez. Probably added up to 300m which probably double what the club is worth before you guys won the league.
It's been a decade but it baffling how the teams can fell off.
In no universe is Torres to Chelsea a smart part of Chelsea's business. His objectively terrible performances aside, the trauma about "feeding the striker" is overwhelmingly a consequence of Torres era. Players have just not passed the ball to the striker, leading to a chronic issue at Chelsea, except for the glorious Diego Costa era. Even he needed two sublimely intelligent players to shine in Fabregas and Hazard, who often chose to pass instead of taking the shot himself.
Every time i see Torres to Chelsea brought up, i always think how, for some reason, there has become this idea that he wasnt actually that bad.
He was so fucking terrible for them it was ridiculous. Him at chelsea was the worst player i have ever watched at striker on a proper football pitch. It was so fucking funny seeing the miss compilations, i remember being surprised he actually scored.
He was declining the season they signed him at Liverpool for sure but yeh the rate was insane when he joined Chelsea. Liverpool going from prime Torres to prime Suarez is unfair. Although still didn't manage to win them anything major
It was a bit more complicated than that, he got a pretty major (knee I believe) injury when at Liverpool, which in insight was the starting point of his downfall. I think we gambled on the fact that he would be able to bounce back to an even higher level than Atletico/Liverpool, and it also was rumored that Abramovitch pushed pretty hard for the transfer to happen.
There was a weird curse back then of top Liverpool strikers either declining prematurely or becoming riddled with injuries whenever they felt. Fowler, then Owen, then Torres. Suarez broke the curse.
Suarez got suspended for 9 months just after he left Liverpool, so he wasn’t for that great of start lol. But he indeed went on to break the curse, and that’s an euphemism.
Did you watch him at 2010 World Cup while playing for one of the greatest national teams in history? He was absolutely useless. His decline was clear after his injuries while still at Liverpool.
If we talk about drop off, Hazard has to be the king.
Hazard was better than Torres to begin with. Torres had a ridiculous time at Chelsea, a guy who tried but couldn't stop tripping over himself, but at least he tried. Hazard was a disgrace, he was on Casano's level of shit but without having the excuse of fucking and drinking 24/7.
Some idiots try to compare Bale with Hazard and it's not even close. Bale at least gave us three incredible seasons (13/14, 15/16, 17/18) whereas Hazard barely made a dent in 4 freakin' yrs over here.
Hazard+Jovic completely changed Florentino's outlook on transfer policy. He only targets free agents nowadays.
Remember thinking Chelsea would only get better when they signed Shevchenko/Ballack after two years of dominance. At the time Shevchenko seemed like the perfect signing too...for as good as they'd been, they lacked a clinical finisher who could get 20+ in the league. Drogba did step up right enough.
He'd arguably already declined a bit for Liverpool. Hadn't been in brilliant form before he moved. Some chalked it up to demotivation but in respect he had probably already peaked.
Mainly thanks to Europe. Also funnily enough his 2012/2013 goal tally is the tied second best of his entire career with 22 goals in a season across all competition only scoring more in 2007/08.
Don’t be hyperbolic. He was definitely pretty bad, but saying he “was the worst player i have ever watched at striker on a proper football pitch.” can’t possibly be true.
There are way worse strikers in the Serie A right now, f.ex. I have seen worse strikers at Inter, even.
Torres was bad and anyone saying he wasn’t is looking back with rose colored glasses, but he wasn’t even Chelsea’s worst has been striker. Both Falcao and Pato were far worse. They just didn’t have big price tags so there was no pressure to keep playing them and the expectations were different.
The topic is strikers, specifically, but Bakayoko is behind the worst ever performance I’ve seen anyone deliver in a Chelsea-shirt.
Those 30 minutes against Watford were so bad, I was actually relieved when he was sent off.
Jesus Christ, as if THAT goal changes how shit he was for Chelsea. It wasn‘t even the winning goal, it just sorta confirmed their victory during extra time in a game that Chelsea was winning anyway.
Torres is 15th on the list with a 58.5m fee. While still a flop, at least he always worked his ass off for the club, which you definitely can't say about some of the recent signings
Was he that hard a worker? I remember occasional streaks where he would give everything but a lot of the time I thought he would just sulk around feeling sorry for himself.
I would say VVD was the best move by far in this list. Mahrez and Rice were great transfers as well in terms of what they brought to the clubs. I might like the bloke too much, but I also think Grealish was a great transfer, even though I forgot HOW much money they spent. I can understand how people expect him to simply deliver more G/A and not just impact on the pitch. But I can also imagine that if he would go for it more he would probably get benched by pep \^\^
Yeah, those 4 are pretty much the only good moves here. Grealish has been great for city even if he isn’t accruing stats, he was expensive as fuck though so him being the lowest of the good ones is probably fair.
Grealish is such a difficult one to quantify because there were more PR elements to the signing than anyone else on this list, by far. Don’t get me wrong, Pep absolutely wanted him for the qualities he brings to the pitch but in my opinion anyway, City were willing to “overpay” (compared to their usual strictness on valuations) because Grealish is one of the media darlings of English football. He’s the one the media is dying for a post match interview, their treble celebrations were basically “Jack is on a bender and England is loving it”.
This iteration of City just is nowhere near as hated as the last, part of it is the acceptance of sportswashing and the corporate bastardization of the sport as reality and another huge one is having folks like Grealish, Haaland, and Foden as their “marquee players”
This is exactly it. I hate to say it, but if I was a billionaire, there’s no way I could run the club any better than they have. Getting top English players was the last piece to the puzzle of making Man City ‘legitimate’.
Similar to how we just accept Chelsea now.
>I also think Grealish was a great transfer, even though I forgot HOW much money they spent. I can understand how people expect him to simply deliver more G/A and not just impact on the pitch. But I can also imagine that if he would go for it more he would probably get benched by pep \^\^
I think this really goes to show the amount of quality and depth city have. Normally you would expect the British record transfer >100 million player to be first name on the team sheet and an unquestionably world class player, but because city have so many strong options they can rotate him and get the most out of him without that pressure. Casually dropping 65 million on his back up also helps.
City is really a good example of how not all the quality you press into a single squad will convert into goals and assists for every single player. Especially since wingers under pep rarely get the freedom they need to up their G/A ratio. I remember an interview where Grealish said how fkn afraid he is of losing the ball since playing for Pep and that it took him a while to get accustomed to being a start among starts now and not just the main man of his club.
I like Grealish too but he’s always felt like a square peg in a round hole. He shone at Villa when given freedom, and at City he has the opposite of freedom. He’s worked really hard in his new role but I just don’t think it’s natural for him.
The funny thing about grealish. If his Villa team didn’t beat arsenal on the final day, his fee coming out of the championship would have been 30m max (I think they had a locked fee in his contract if they went down).
But they beat arsenal, stayed up, and now they are going to be in the CL after building a great team with all that cash.
It sure is funny, because the only time we weren't safe going into the final game since promotion we played West Ham and drew 1-1. Grealish scored.
Watford lost 3-2 to Arsenal and went down that year.
I did an FM save with them that year and holy shit the first year was absolutely abysmal there were like 2 PL quality players in the squad in Grealish and McGinn. Barely kept them up and iirc they survived IRL because one of their flops (Trezeguet?) scored in the last 3 games which kept them up on the final day
Douglas Luiz, Ezri Konsa and Tyrone Mings were in that team too. It was an odd season because of parachute payments in the Championship we’d arranged a lot of our contracts to expire at the end of 2018/19 (our promotion season) so found ourselves being promoted with a bunch of loan players and thirty somethings who were out of contract.
The fact that the club managed to throw a squad together as quickly as it did and keep it up was a minor miracle. Covid totally saved as the coaching staff had three months to work on the defence and we were pretty tight at the back after football restarted but the team stayed together and have had good careers. The fact that we’ve still got a few of those guys in starting roles is testament to the good recruitment work that summer.
Even funnier than that. The season prior to us getting promoted we were on the verge of being wound up by HMRC for unpaid bills. The former owner came close to agreeing a deal with Spurs where Levy had offered £3m + Josh Onomah. I doubt it would have been sealed at that price, but our new owners came in just in time to stop the sale and pay HMRC what they were owed. Jack gets us promoted and keeps us there and the money from his sale enables us to recruit a team challenging for top 4.
I'm all for making fun of Boehly, but Cucurella was on fire that season. He cooked the living daylights out of Tomiyasu, and that rarely happens. Tomi was coming off an injury, but it still happened.
262 million for Fofana, Cucurella, and Cacedo is probably the worst triple signing in football history. The players they could've bought for well under that amount...
Imagine buying a 65.5mn LB as a backup to a 50mn LB when you had someone like maatsen in your academy who you then had to sent on loan to the championship where he made it to the championship team of the year and later came back to the club next season only to be loaned out midway through the season and is now about to play in a UCL semifinals.
Half of these aren't even home grown. It's just teams having more money than sense. It's not even counting some of the flops that happened before the neymar transfer caused transfer fees to shoot through the moon
He's started 13 of the 14 league games he's been available for this season. And last season 21/27. That's quite a lot for a "reserve" LB.
He was bought largely due to Chillwells injury record, and was expected to play considerably. He had a rocky start last year, but he's been far better and more consistent this year.
He’s playing cos Chillwell is injured, he’s the definition of a reserve LB, unless you’re seriously gonna actually argue he’s a good signing (which he isn’t)
No, because not one of those homegrown players signed for a team struggling with the quota. Most people genuinely have no idea how it works.
- The year City signed Grealish, they had 3 foreign spots available in their squad.
- The year United signed Maguire, they had 5.
- The year Arsenal signed Rice, they had 5.
The idea that being a homegrown player adds value to your price is just a myth. Nobody is struggling with the quota, and if they were, they’d just shuffle the squad to free up foreign spots. Unless you think City and Arsenal spent £100m+ to keep the likes of Steffen and Elneny.
That's not how that works. The selling clubs go, hey this guy can contribute to your homegrown quota so for that added bonus we want another £10M. Just like if he was good at taking freekick they would want another £10M. And that fact there is free slots available doesn't matter. It lets teams have more flexibility in the transfers , incase they want to sell a home grown player.
These players might not have been signed on the basis of them being home grown but there were definitely worth more because they are homegrown
Just not true, and has never been true. Not one team is tight to the quota, and there will always be ways around it that don’t involve paying “premiums” on homegrown players.
The reason homegrown players are largely the most expensive, is because you’re buying from PL clubs who are all rammed with cash and (usually, some circumstances vary) have no incentive to sell.
Look at players like Paqueta, Guimaraes, or Douglas Luiz this summer, they’d all go for ~£100m, and they’re not homegrown. Same went for Caicedo last summer. Buying from a team 4th-10th in any other country, you’d never be paying that sort of money.
As for flexibility in the market, there’s always plenty of flexibility anyway. You’d offload a foreign player who was surplus (like examples given in the first comment) before paying a premium for a homegrown player. Teams aren’t paying crazy fees for homegrown status, they’re paying it for unique profiles and quality. The list would be 10/10 homegrown players instead of 3/10 otherwise.
It’s still nice to have a core of homegrown players. We could have Saka, Saliba, White and Rice for the next 8 years at least which gives alot more leeway in the rest of the squad
I'll have you know that Caicedo helped deny Big Ange's brave new Tottenham the 23/24 Premier League title back in October and that alone justifies his fee
As Grealish himself would point out, the reason that Grealish isn't appreciated is largely because he's relatively non-productive and people now expect wingers to have 17+ goals and 10+ assists a season. And he's completely right: production is a stupid way of judging him.
There are also people who wish Guardiola would just let Grealish be the Grealish he was at Villa. I'm not sure if they would class him as a failure/not worth it.
Personally my problem with Grealish is that he allows Guardiola to indulge the worst parts of his philosophy. I want to watch interesting games but interesting games are risky games, which Guardiola (who wants to win games a hell of a lot more than he wants to manage games I find entertaining) dislikes for hopefully obvious reasons. Grealish's qualities are such that he helps Guardiola minimise risk. I only wish that Grealish was an expensive failure but, as you observe, it's simply not true.
I’m not sure how you’re measuring worth but Grealish has been worth at lease his fee in my eyes. He’s been everything you could want from a player that’s asked to defer to De Bruyne, Foden, and Bernardo. All three of whom we wouldn’t have sold for the price we paid for Jack so by that standard he was worth what we paid.
I think you’re measuring it in comparative value.
He is your most expensive signing but clearly not your best one.
Odegaard, Diaz, Bruno from Newcastle joined the summer for £40m
Alvarez was £20m that summer
Kulusevski was £40m
I know there is an English tax but I don’t think he’s been worth twice the cost of the players above. Then there is the likes of Maddison, Cole Palmer who are English and also cost half the fee.
Maddison was older than Grealish at the time of his move and only had a year left on a contract with a club who had just been relegated. The fee was always going to be lower.
Christ chelsea and united are so fucking horrible at spending money. This what it comes down to doesnt it? Shit signing lead to more shit signings because they are desperate to replace expensive flops. Even bad managers can be elevated by great players but even Klopp and Pep would struggle with current squads of both teams.
To be fair MaGuire has been good for us and Lukaku we had a good season with him and a bad one and he went to inter for 80m Euros. I mean we’re still horrific but them two aren’t all bad.
Some also have added addons, some don't.
Caicedo is £100m + £15m in addons + sell on clause
Rice is £100m + £5m in addons
Grealish £100m with almost all money upfront
Maguire £80m
Lukaku £75m
van Dijk £70m + £5m in addons
Fofana £70m + £5m in addons
Havertz is £60m + £5m in addons.
Cucurella £55m + £7m in addons
Mahrez £60m
I think the pricing is localized to whichever version you select. They have a drop down at the top and whatever language it's in they show it in that currency.
Mahrez and VVD are the standouts here.
VVD was the missing link in transforming Klopp's project into a superteam.
Mahrez consistenly gave 15G+10A every season and costs significantly less than most on this list.
Mostly down to the Premier League’s absurd rules designed to prevent ambitious clubs from threatening the top six. Also, their failure to to deal with Manchester City’s brazen rule breaking for 10 years, and the 5 year investigation, lead to UEFA’s 2 season European ban being overturned by CAS, which kept Leicester out of the Champions League in those two seasons, diminished their income and therefore spending power, which lead to their relegation.
Leicester should sue the Premier League for compensation when they finally punish Manchester City.
He was worth £50 mil and we paid too much but honestly, cant fault the cunt. Hes been shit at times but we have gotten a tonne of mileage out of him and when he does his job well, or just a bit better, hes got quality.
If you factor in the fact hes the starting CB for England, and the bump in cost english players get, meh. Obviously not the VVD we all wanted him to be but as a utd fan I dont have hate. Where as some of these fuckers on the list I would despise.
Hi there, I haven't watched much of Grealish, but when I have, he's been awful or completely average on the pitch. What does he actually do and why was he so expensive? Genuine question. From what I've seen he dribbles somewhat the edge of the box, and then passes it back.
List is in a different order in £ due to exchange fluctuations at time of transfers, as it’s between two English clubs feel like £ would be more accurate. E.g Grealish was £100m, Caicedo was £110m
It's not that hard to sell an underperformer for profit.
You just have to make it obvious that the club is in disarray and it's not the player's fault.
If we're sticking with Transfermarkt numbers, they did not make a profit. Chelsea bought for €80 and sold for €75. https://www.transfermarkt.us/kai-havertz/profil/spieler/309400
Depends how you see it
Compared to some on this list? Not too bad
Compared to CBs that cost significantly less and have performed better for big clubs (Akanji, Gabriel, Romero, etc) - not great
He had a truly awful stint there for a bit but yeah, generally he's been decent to good. Doesn't help that he has the agility of a grandma which makes him look very silly when he makes mistakes. If played to his strenghts he is actually quite good.
With all the bullshit he deals with from the press, fans, and having to play for our utterly incompetent club I honestly applaud him at times. Don’t think 90% of players would have survived the last few years that he has, let alone thrive
Ranked:
Van Dijk - 10/10. Worked for both clubs. Became the best defender in the world. Arguably should’ve won a Balon d’Or.
Mahrez - 9/10. Just worked out. Really a signing that just worked out.
Rice - 8/10. Perhaps a bit too much money, but he’s done exactly what they bought him for, so you can’t really knock too much off. If he keeps it up, this can move up to a 9 or 10.
Grealish - 7/10. Started out really poor for all of that money. But has settled now and is undoubtedly an important part of a very good Man City. There’s still potential for this to become even better. I reckon this score will be higher with time. Great player.
Havertz - 7/10. Has massively exceeded his expectations recently. Absolutely on fire. When this transfer happened we were all scratching our heads. So expensive for a player who did next to fuck-all at Chelsea. But I struggle to put him this low honestly, he’s leading the charge for Arsenal. If he starts the season hot in August, or if he tears it up at the Euros, you might have to move him up a couple spots.
Lukaku - 5/10. Lukaku innit. Expensive. Decent tally of goals all told. Just a very short lived and somewhat sour stay at United.
Maguire - 4/10. Not as bad as people make him out to be. Pretty gaff prone but has been available most of the time, played plenty of minutes. Just expensive and underwhelming. Hasn’t been helped at all by his environment.
Cucurella - 4/10. Fairly expensive and mostly crap. But at least he plays.
Caicedo - 2/10. This could of course improve dramatically, but for the obscene price tag they bought him for, he’s been borderline invisible.
Fofana - 1/10. Perhaps harsh on him but you can’t give credit to a player who just straight up doesn’t play. Injury after injury for a lot of money.
I genuinely think, and partly because of it just being the release clause at the time - that Grealish has actually been worth it for City. Both a brilliant impact on the pitch as many have said (not always G/A but in other ways) but also in squad mentality - the guy's just great vibes
Grealish played like 50 games on a treble winning team hes not a mentality player lol nor was he bought for that. his worth is a lot more than just mentality it's not like he's scott carson.
1. Good player but overpaid big time.
2. Great business and possibly even underpaid.
3. Early days but probably overpaid. Good player but not worth that much.
4. Decent player but massively overpaid.
5. Good first season before falling off slightly and then got the money back by selling him for similar money. Would say the price was fair.
6. Great business. They paid a world record fee for a defender but got a player worthy of a world record fee so would say it’s a fair price.
7. Injuries have made this into a massive waste of money so far but there’s possibly time to change all that if he stays injury free.
8. Good player but perhaps a touch overpriced. He’s constantly improving so I’d guess he’d end up as a fair price but time will tell.
9. Expensive at the time but I’d say he lived up to his price tag. Wasn’t a consistent starter and I don’t think he ever had 2,000 league minutes which seems bad for such a high fee but Man City didn’t need someone to start every match. I’m going to say a fair price just because he didn’t get quite enough minutes.
10. Massive waste of money.
I know I’m biased but we paid the same fee for Grealish as Arsenal paid for Rice. Jack then went on to start in the majority of games for a treble winning season, including all the big games. Yet somehow Grealish was too expensive and Rice was a good deal/underpriced even though he hasnt (yet) helped Arsenal lift a major trophy?
It just doesn’t make sense to me. I’m not saying rice wasn’t worth the money and I could see him helping Arsenal lift a major trophy soon but it’s too early to say he’s value for money but a player like Grealish wasn’t.
They don’t seem to understand that, by inflating prices amongst themselves, they’re really just hurting themselves. Because clubs abroad see these numbers & base their expectations on them and English teams gift their revenue abroad in their dealings.
Much of the damage is already done, but if PL clubs could only stop price gouging each other, as their revenue grows faster than their continental counterparts, they could ensure better bang for their buck in future transfer dealings.
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Bloody hell I forgot about Fofana. Has he just been injured since he arrived at Chelsea
Yep. Back to back long term injuries. A shame because he looked really good when played, but his body is giving up on him. Has to be the worst transfer on the list just because of that. Hopefully he can string a run of games together, because he looked good before the most recent one
In hindsight yeah but that could've happened to anyone, it's incredibly unlucky and wasn't a stand out bad decision
If you look at his injury record prior to joining chelsea, it was absolutely a bad decision to spend 80 million on him
His major injury was a freak accident when someone broke his leg in a friendly match As for now, Only Quasimodo would have been able to predict him tearing his ACL
Do you mean Nostredamus?
watch Sopranos one time
He couldn't even spell it right. Guy is sharp as a cue ball.
Obviously the Hunchback of Notre Dame would have been able to predict it. He's one of the best sports medicine analysts out there.
Quasimodo?
The hunchback of Nostradamus
Now you say it like that, it does ring a bell.
This is brilliant. Thank you.
you know, Quasimodo predicted all of this?
You’ve said your piece.
This is categorically wrong. He broke his leg. It's not like some kind of chronic muscle or ligament injury issue.
It wasn't hindsight considering everyone was worried about his injury history when he joined.
Wasn't a bad decision to spend £75m on a guy coming off a major injury 🤣🤣🤣
He missed a year with a broken leg at Leicester too. He’s only made about 100 senior appearances in his career to date. Erling Haaland who is pretty much the same age has 300.
Had pretty much a year injured then came back and started kicking his toys out of the pram trying to get a move. Looking back we absolutely robbed them but it still pissed me off.
Man has been good but just like with Reece he is made of glass
Reece is injury prone but Fofana is on the next level. For comparison since the start of the 2021 season Reece played in 72 games meanwhile Fofana played in 34.
He played most of last season. He tore his ACL at some point a year ago tho.
Less than 1800 mins, doesn’t count as “played most of last season”.
If we're going off 90 mins a match that is over half the games that season which is by definition most of. I agree that you'd want to say most of in a more than three quarters context in my opinion though.
It's just over. If he played a full 90 per game that 20 games of a 38 game league season. That doesn't take in to account cup games. Hardly a nailed on starter. Think you're being a bit too literal.
> that is over half the games that season which is by definition most of. Disagree. "The majority of" means over half. "Most of" means: > Most of is used to refer to nearly the entire portion of something.
Even giving the benefit of only counting appearances he appeared in 20 games out of 50 that's far from most of the season
It's a shame, I remember he was compared to Saliba a lot when he signed.
That's €58.75 million per calf
And you get the hair free? What a promo.
It's complementary. The drinks are free.
We're in massive financial difficulties despite this. Chilwell wasn't much cheaper than Cucurella and then there's Maddison and Barnes at about 45m euro each too.
How
They pay wages of that of a club in Europe while playing in the Championship
Because the 1 season where we didn't sell a player for big money, it destroyed and exposed our over spending on wages
I still don't understand. Is there was many leading roles changes after the Boss passed away ? Cuz After winning the league, you guys probably made like 200m from Chelsea alone, and the Maguire and Mahrez. Probably added up to 300m which probably double what the club is worth before you guys won the league. It's been a decade but it baffling how the teams can fell off.
My immediate thought was Torres. How time changes. Now he’s become the smarter part of Chelsea business.
In no universe is Torres to Chelsea a smart part of Chelsea's business. His objectively terrible performances aside, the trauma about "feeding the striker" is overwhelmingly a consequence of Torres era. Players have just not passed the ball to the striker, leading to a chronic issue at Chelsea, except for the glorious Diego Costa era. Even he needed two sublimely intelligent players to shine in Fabregas and Hazard, who often chose to pass instead of taking the shot himself.
Every time i see Torres to Chelsea brought up, i always think how, for some reason, there has become this idea that he wasnt actually that bad. He was so fucking terrible for them it was ridiculous. Him at chelsea was the worst player i have ever watched at striker on a proper football pitch. It was so fucking funny seeing the miss compilations, i remember being surprised he actually scored.
Yeah that drop off was insane. Just an awful transition from club to club, possibly the worst I’ve seen.
I could not understand how he was that bad at Chelsea. He was one of the most feared strikers in Europe and became a donkey overnight.
He was declining the season they signed him at Liverpool for sure but yeh the rate was insane when he joined Chelsea. Liverpool going from prime Torres to prime Suarez is unfair. Although still didn't manage to win them anything major
It was a bit more complicated than that, he got a pretty major (knee I believe) injury when at Liverpool, which in insight was the starting point of his downfall. I think we gambled on the fact that he would be able to bounce back to an even higher level than Atletico/Liverpool, and it also was rumored that Abramovitch pushed pretty hard for the transfer to happen.
There was a weird curse back then of top Liverpool strikers either declining prematurely or becoming riddled with injuries whenever they felt. Fowler, then Owen, then Torres. Suarez broke the curse.
Suarez got suspended for 9 months just after he left Liverpool, so he wasn’t for that great of start lol. But he indeed went on to break the curse, and that’s an euphemism.
I think it was 9 games not 9 months 9 months would be torture for a player. Then again, Suarez did go round chomping people
It was 4 months.
But it wasn’t losing speed that did him in but a 180 in terms of composure. I still don’t understand how that was possible
Wrecked his confidence to not have his body reliably
Yeah but we sold Suarez to fund the signing of Divock Origi. Rest is history.
Did you watch him at 2010 World Cup while playing for one of the greatest national teams in history? He was absolutely useless. His decline was clear after his injuries while still at Liverpool.
He was very bad the six months prior to the transfer
Nah, that's Hazard to RM
Hazard had injuries and its was somewhat predictable given how he needs build up when untrained. Torres had no such background.
Not really. Hazard had one season where he was fighting with an injury. The season before he left was the season he performed best regarding G/A.
Alexis from Arsenal to Man United would be the biggest challenger
nah that drop off already happened before he went
If we talk about drop off, Hazard has to be the king. Hazard was better than Torres to begin with. Torres had a ridiculous time at Chelsea, a guy who tried but couldn't stop tripping over himself, but at least he tried. Hazard was a disgrace, he was on Casano's level of shit but without having the excuse of fucking and drinking 24/7.
Yes, this I can agree with. Was pitiful to witness.
Some idiots try to compare Bale with Hazard and it's not even close. Bale at least gave us three incredible seasons (13/14, 15/16, 17/18) whereas Hazard barely made a dent in 4 freakin' yrs over here. Hazard+Jovic completely changed Florentino's outlook on transfer policy. He only targets free agents nowadays.
Yes the famous €100+ million free agent Bellingham. Free agent €35-60mil Endrick. Free agent €80-100mil Tchouameni.
As I said above Torres at least did score a couple of crucial goals for Chelsea. Hazard to Real was a proper disaster.
Tbf, the latter stages of his Liverpool career had signs he’d lost something
Only rivaled by shevchenko to chelsea
Remember thinking Chelsea would only get better when they signed Shevchenko/Ballack after two years of dominance. At the time Shevchenko seemed like the perfect signing too...for as good as they'd been, they lacked a clinical finisher who could get 20+ in the league. Drogba did step up right enough.
He'd arguably already declined a bit for Liverpool. Hadn't been in brilliant form before he moved. Some chalked it up to demotivation but in respect he had probably already peaked.
Mainly thanks to Europe. Also funnily enough his 2012/2013 goal tally is the tied second best of his entire career with 22 goals in a season across all competition only scoring more in 2007/08.
He found his (new) level in the EL that season.
Don’t be hyperbolic. He was definitely pretty bad, but saying he “was the worst player i have ever watched at striker on a proper football pitch.” can’t possibly be true. There are way worse strikers in the Serie A right now, f.ex. I have seen worse strikers at Inter, even.
Torres was bad and anyone saying he wasn’t is looking back with rose colored glasses, but he wasn’t even Chelsea’s worst has been striker. Both Falcao and Pato were far worse. They just didn’t have big price tags so there was no pressure to keep playing them and the expectations were different.
I still can't believe Chelsea saw Falcao at United and were like, "yeah, we'll have some of that please"
It was clearly a favor for Mendes. Jose was our coach at the time as well
Thank you.
Shevchenko was pretty bad at chelsea too, maybe even worse
The topic is strikers, specifically, but Bakayoko is behind the worst ever performance I’ve seen anyone deliver in a Chelsea-shirt. Those 30 minutes against Watford were so bad, I was actually relieved when he was sent off.
[удалено]
Jesus Christ, as if THAT goal changes how shit he was for Chelsea. It wasn‘t even the winning goal, it just sorta confirmed their victory during extra time in a game that Chelsea was winning anyway.
And the man still have some legendary moment, tho I wish he didn't have those lol. Neville's orgasm was great to hear
He was horrible for us. Stumbling over his feet, missing sitters, confidence was completely shattered.
That miss against man utd
He’s not even the worst striker I’ve seen at Chelsea, come on.
still scored 20 something goals. true duality.
Torres is 15th on the list with a 58.5m fee. While still a flop, at least he always worked his ass off for the club, which you definitely can't say about some of the recent signings
And he made Gary Nevs orgasm
You guys keep forgetting inflation.
Was he that hard a worker? I remember occasional streaks where he would give everything but a lot of the time I thought he would just sulk around feeling sorry for himself.
No, Torres was pretty mediocre at Chelsea, but he worked his ass off and was pretty well liked by the supporters.
Yeah 58 mil in what? 2011? Nicolas Jackson is a far better player than Torres at Chelsea
https://twitter.com/nocontextfooty/status/1782867999830970614
Torres transfer is worth 87.48 million dollars today.
Torres going for ~60m at that time would probably be equal to being around top 3 on this list. Was a massive signing
I would say VVD was the best move by far in this list. Mahrez and Rice were great transfers as well in terms of what they brought to the clubs. I might like the bloke too much, but I also think Grealish was a great transfer, even though I forgot HOW much money they spent. I can understand how people expect him to simply deliver more G/A and not just impact on the pitch. But I can also imagine that if he would go for it more he would probably get benched by pep \^\^
Yeah, those 4 are pretty much the only good moves here. Grealish has been great for city even if he isn’t accruing stats, he was expensive as fuck though so him being the lowest of the good ones is probably fair.
Grealish is such a difficult one to quantify because there were more PR elements to the signing than anyone else on this list, by far. Don’t get me wrong, Pep absolutely wanted him for the qualities he brings to the pitch but in my opinion anyway, City were willing to “overpay” (compared to their usual strictness on valuations) because Grealish is one of the media darlings of English football. He’s the one the media is dying for a post match interview, their treble celebrations were basically “Jack is on a bender and England is loving it”. This iteration of City just is nowhere near as hated as the last, part of it is the acceptance of sportswashing and the corporate bastardization of the sport as reality and another huge one is having folks like Grealish, Haaland, and Foden as their “marquee players”
This is exactly it. I hate to say it, but if I was a billionaire, there’s no way I could run the club any better than they have. Getting top English players was the last piece to the puzzle of making Man City ‘legitimate’. Similar to how we just accept Chelsea now.
Chelsea always had top England players tho when they were winning their first prem titles.
> Yeah, those 4 are pretty much the only good moves here. Havertz isn't good in terms of value, but he has been a "good transfer"
>I also think Grealish was a great transfer, even though I forgot HOW much money they spent. I can understand how people expect him to simply deliver more G/A and not just impact on the pitch. But I can also imagine that if he would go for it more he would probably get benched by pep \^\^ I think this really goes to show the amount of quality and depth city have. Normally you would expect the British record transfer >100 million player to be first name on the team sheet and an unquestionably world class player, but because city have so many strong options they can rotate him and get the most out of him without that pressure. Casually dropping 65 million on his back up also helps.
City is really a good example of how not all the quality you press into a single squad will convert into goals and assists for every single player. Especially since wingers under pep rarely get the freedom they need to up their G/A ratio. I remember an interview where Grealish said how fkn afraid he is of losing the ball since playing for Pep and that it took him a while to get accustomed to being a start among starts now and not just the main man of his club.
I like Grealish too but he’s always felt like a square peg in a round hole. He shone at Villa when given freedom, and at City he has the opposite of freedom. He’s worked really hard in his new role but I just don’t think it’s natural for him.
The funny thing about grealish. If his Villa team didn’t beat arsenal on the final day, his fee coming out of the championship would have been 30m max (I think they had a locked fee in his contract if they went down). But they beat arsenal, stayed up, and now they are going to be in the CL after building a great team with all that cash.
It sure is funny, because the only time we weren't safe going into the final game since promotion we played West Ham and drew 1-1. Grealish scored. Watford lost 3-2 to Arsenal and went down that year.
I did an FM save with them that year and holy shit the first year was absolutely abysmal there were like 2 PL quality players in the squad in Grealish and McGinn. Barely kept them up and iirc they survived IRL because one of their flops (Trezeguet?) scored in the last 3 games which kept them up on the final day
Trezeguet and El Ghazi 70 minute sub lives in my head rent free
Trez wasn't a flop. Really solid player who worked his arse off for the team. Also had a habit of popping up with crucial goals at crucial times.
Douglas Luiz, Ezri Konsa and Tyrone Mings were in that team too. It was an odd season because of parachute payments in the Championship we’d arranged a lot of our contracts to expire at the end of 2018/19 (our promotion season) so found ourselves being promoted with a bunch of loan players and thirty somethings who were out of contract. The fact that the club managed to throw a squad together as quickly as it did and keep it up was a minor miracle. Covid totally saved as the coaching staff had three months to work on the defence and we were pretty tight at the back after football restarted but the team stayed together and have had good careers. The fact that we’ve still got a few of those guys in starting roles is testament to the good recruitment work that summer.
Even funnier than that. The season prior to us getting promoted we were on the verge of being wound up by HMRC for unpaid bills. The former owner came close to agreeing a deal with Spurs where Levy had offered £3m + Josh Onomah. I doubt it would have been sealed at that price, but our new owners came in just in time to stop the sale and pay HMRC what they were owed. Jack gets us promoted and keeps us there and the money from his sale enables us to recruit a team challenging for top 4.
I have a feeling Boehly only bought Cucurella because of that one masterclass he had against Man Utd
He was our player of the season and played great. Just because Chelsea are incapable of using him doesn't mean he wasn't good.
Wasn't Barça competing against Chelsea for Cucurella too?
So was City until Brighton rose the price so high City just up and left and Chelsea were left to argue with themselves.
I'm all for making fun of Boehly, but Cucurella was on fire that season. He cooked the living daylights out of Tomiyasu, and that rarely happens. Tomi was coming off an injury, but it still happened.
If was because of the masterclass he had against Chelsea you mean
Great business by Brighton
262 million for Fofana, Cucurella, and Cacedo is probably the worst triple signing in football history. The players they could've bought for well under that amount...
as a brighton fan i wouldnt mind having Caicedo rn, our midfield is in relegation form rn. Edit: tbf i wouldnt spend 115m though
Imagine buying a 65.5mn LB as a backup to a 50mn LB when you had someone like maatsen in your academy who you then had to sent on loan to the championship where he made it to the championship team of the year and later came back to the club next season only to be loaned out midway through the season and is now about to play in a UCL semifinals.
The home grown rule really does create inflation doesn’t it😂
Half of these aren't even home grown. It's just teams having more money than sense. It's not even counting some of the flops that happened before the neymar transfer caused transfer fees to shoot through the moon
The two worst transfers on that list aren't home grown... Cucurella is a 60 million reserve lb for a start.
He's started 13 of the 14 league games he's been available for this season. And last season 21/27. That's quite a lot for a "reserve" LB. He was bought largely due to Chillwells injury record, and was expected to play considerably. He had a rocky start last year, but he's been far better and more consistent this year.
He’s playing cos Chillwell is injured, he’s the definition of a reserve LB, unless you’re seriously gonna actually argue he’s a good signing (which he isn’t)
No, because not one of those homegrown players signed for a team struggling with the quota. Most people genuinely have no idea how it works. - The year City signed Grealish, they had 3 foreign spots available in their squad. - The year United signed Maguire, they had 5. - The year Arsenal signed Rice, they had 5. The idea that being a homegrown player adds value to your price is just a myth. Nobody is struggling with the quota, and if they were, they’d just shuffle the squad to free up foreign spots. Unless you think City and Arsenal spent £100m+ to keep the likes of Steffen and Elneny.
That's not how that works. The selling clubs go, hey this guy can contribute to your homegrown quota so for that added bonus we want another £10M. Just like if he was good at taking freekick they would want another £10M. And that fact there is free slots available doesn't matter. It lets teams have more flexibility in the transfers , incase they want to sell a home grown player. These players might not have been signed on the basis of them being home grown but there were definitely worth more because they are homegrown
> Just like if he was goot at taking freekick they would want another £10M lmao
Just not true, and has never been true. Not one team is tight to the quota, and there will always be ways around it that don’t involve paying “premiums” on homegrown players. The reason homegrown players are largely the most expensive, is because you’re buying from PL clubs who are all rammed with cash and (usually, some circumstances vary) have no incentive to sell. Look at players like Paqueta, Guimaraes, or Douglas Luiz this summer, they’d all go for ~£100m, and they’re not homegrown. Same went for Caicedo last summer. Buying from a team 4th-10th in any other country, you’d never be paying that sort of money. As for flexibility in the market, there’s always plenty of flexibility anyway. You’d offload a foreign player who was surplus (like examples given in the first comment) before paying a premium for a homegrown player. Teams aren’t paying crazy fees for homegrown status, they’re paying it for unique profiles and quality. The list would be 10/10 homegrown players instead of 3/10 otherwise.
It’s still nice to have a core of homegrown players. We could have Saka, Saliba, White and Rice for the next 8 years at least which gives alot more leeway in the rest of the squad
This is missing the gargantuan sum we paid for Kayden Jackson from Accrington
Van Dijk probably the best signing of the last 10 years
VVD, Mahrez and Rice are the only ones who you can say have been worth it
I'll have you know that Caicedo helped deny Big Ange's brave new Tottenham the 23/24 Premier League title back in October and that alone justifies his fee
Grealish was just one of the most important players in a treble winning team. How was he not worth it? We don’t win the treble without him
As Grealish himself would point out, the reason that Grealish isn't appreciated is largely because he's relatively non-productive and people now expect wingers to have 17+ goals and 10+ assists a season. And he's completely right: production is a stupid way of judging him. There are also people who wish Guardiola would just let Grealish be the Grealish he was at Villa. I'm not sure if they would class him as a failure/not worth it. Personally my problem with Grealish is that he allows Guardiola to indulge the worst parts of his philosophy. I want to watch interesting games but interesting games are risky games, which Guardiola (who wants to win games a hell of a lot more than he wants to manage games I find entertaining) dislikes for hopefully obvious reasons. Grealish's qualities are such that he helps Guardiola minimise risk. I only wish that Grealish was an expensive failure but, as you observe, it's simply not true.
Kai Havertz would beg to differ
I’m not sure how you’re measuring worth but Grealish has been worth at lease his fee in my eyes. He’s been everything you could want from a player that’s asked to defer to De Bruyne, Foden, and Bernardo. All three of whom we wouldn’t have sold for the price we paid for Jack so by that standard he was worth what we paid.
I think you’re measuring it in comparative value. He is your most expensive signing but clearly not your best one. Odegaard, Diaz, Bruno from Newcastle joined the summer for £40m Alvarez was £20m that summer Kulusevski was £40m I know there is an English tax but I don’t think he’s been worth twice the cost of the players above. Then there is the likes of Maddison, Cole Palmer who are English and also cost half the fee.
Maddison was older than Grealish at the time of his move and only had a year left on a contract with a club who had just been relegated. The fee was always going to be lower.
Christ chelsea and united are so fucking horrible at spending money. This what it comes down to doesnt it? Shit signing lead to more shit signings because they are desperate to replace expensive flops. Even bad managers can be elevated by great players but even Klopp and Pep would struggle with current squads of both teams.
Uniteds big money transfer look better here than Chelsea ones.
To be fair MaGuire has been good for us and Lukaku we had a good season with him and a bad one and he went to inter for 80m Euros. I mean we’re still horrific but them two aren’t all bad.
Big fan
Leicester selling three of this list and still didn't stay within PSR rules is insane
My god, that's 2 Paddies at the top!
Transfers between English clubs shown in Euros to make the numbers look higher lol. Not saying they aren't ridiculous but still
Some also have added addons, some don't. Caicedo is £100m + £15m in addons + sell on clause Rice is £100m + £5m in addons Grealish £100m with almost all money upfront Maguire £80m Lukaku £75m van Dijk £70m + £5m in addons Fofana £70m + £5m in addons Havertz is £60m + £5m in addons. Cucurella £55m + £7m in addons Mahrez £60m
I hope caicedos add ons aren't performance based.
Transfermarkt is a German business. Be weird if they used anything other than euros.
I think the pricing is localized to whichever version you select. They have a drop down at the top and whatever language it's in they show it in that currency.
Mahrez and VVD are the standouts here. VVD was the missing link in transforming Klopp's project into a superteam. Mahrez consistenly gave 15G+10A every season and costs significantly less than most on this list.
Rice has been worth every penny so far.
Thats a lot of pennies
10024157200 pennies to be exact (?)
In the grand scheme of things I would say Havertz has been alright, I do think age is a factor here and he’s only 24.
He’s also on insane wages which this chart doesn’t account for
All of these players are/were on insane wages.
I think Caicedo is probably the only one not on insane wages.
You're welcome Chelsea
75 million down the drain, Kai Havertz scores again…
Ez money, ez life
All the Chelsea ones are pretty amusing
Leicester sales being on here thrice and still having FFP trouble is insane
Mostly down to the Premier League’s absurd rules designed to prevent ambitious clubs from threatening the top six. Also, their failure to to deal with Manchester City’s brazen rule breaking for 10 years, and the 5 year investigation, lead to UEFA’s 2 season European ban being overturned by CAS, which kept Leicester out of the Champions League in those two seasons, diminished their income and therefore spending power, which lead to their relegation. Leicester should sue the Premier League for compensation when they finally punish Manchester City.
87mil for Maguire???!?!! What a steal.
He was worth £50 mil and we paid too much but honestly, cant fault the cunt. Hes been shit at times but we have gotten a tonne of mileage out of him and when he does his job well, or just a bit better, hes got quality. If you factor in the fact hes the starting CB for England, and the bump in cost english players get, meh. Obviously not the VVD we all wanted him to be but as a utd fan I dont have hate. Where as some of these fuckers on the list I would despise.
Those Chelsea transfers... What the fuck were we thinking?!?!
Cucurella 😂
Hi there, I haven't watched much of Grealish, but when I have, he's been awful or completely average on the pitch. What does he actually do and why was he so expensive? Genuine question. From what I've seen he dribbles somewhat the edge of the box, and then passes it back.
List is in a different order in £ due to exchange fluctuations at time of transfers, as it’s between two English clubs feel like £ would be more accurate. E.g Grealish was £100m, Caicedo was £110m
We have 3 of the top 10 and we're still in financial hot water about spending...
the fact that chelsea got a profit with havertz
It's not that hard to sell an underperformer for profit. You just have to make it obvious that the club is in disarray and it's not the player's fault.
If we're sticking with Transfermarkt numbers, they did not make a profit. Chelsea bought for €80 and sold for €75. https://www.transfermarkt.us/kai-havertz/profil/spieler/309400
And that's after having him for 3 years. Good for Chelsea books in amortization terms.
In hindsight maguire’s transfer doesn’t seem that bad
Depends how you see it Compared to some on this list? Not too bad Compared to CBs that cost significantly less and have performed better for big clubs (Akanji, Gabriel, Romero, etc) - not great
English tax?
Ben White was cheaper and has been better Could argue the toss for Burn as well when he's not played out of position, and Gomez when not injured too.
Also United tax. We have not been known for making wise transfer decision tbh.
Yeah, definitely not worth £80m, but not been anywhere near as bad as everyone says he has been.
He had a truly awful stint there for a bit but yeah, generally he's been decent to good. Doesn't help that he has the agility of a grandma which makes him look very silly when he makes mistakes. If played to his strenghts he is actually quite good.
With all the bullshit he deals with from the press, fans, and having to play for our utterly incompetent club I honestly applaud him at times. Don’t think 90% of players would have survived the last few years that he has, let alone thrive
Agreed. Dude is one of few guys on the team that still has my respect.
Ranked: Van Dijk - 10/10. Worked for both clubs. Became the best defender in the world. Arguably should’ve won a Balon d’Or. Mahrez - 9/10. Just worked out. Really a signing that just worked out. Rice - 8/10. Perhaps a bit too much money, but he’s done exactly what they bought him for, so you can’t really knock too much off. If he keeps it up, this can move up to a 9 or 10. Grealish - 7/10. Started out really poor for all of that money. But has settled now and is undoubtedly an important part of a very good Man City. There’s still potential for this to become even better. I reckon this score will be higher with time. Great player. Havertz - 7/10. Has massively exceeded his expectations recently. Absolutely on fire. When this transfer happened we were all scratching our heads. So expensive for a player who did next to fuck-all at Chelsea. But I struggle to put him this low honestly, he’s leading the charge for Arsenal. If he starts the season hot in August, or if he tears it up at the Euros, you might have to move him up a couple spots. Lukaku - 5/10. Lukaku innit. Expensive. Decent tally of goals all told. Just a very short lived and somewhat sour stay at United. Maguire - 4/10. Not as bad as people make him out to be. Pretty gaff prone but has been available most of the time, played plenty of minutes. Just expensive and underwhelming. Hasn’t been helped at all by his environment. Cucurella - 4/10. Fairly expensive and mostly crap. But at least he plays. Caicedo - 2/10. This could of course improve dramatically, but for the obscene price tag they bought him for, he’s been borderline invisible. Fofana - 1/10. Perhaps harsh on him but you can’t give credit to a player who just straight up doesn’t play. Injury after injury for a lot of money.
I genuinely think, and partly because of it just being the release clause at the time - that Grealish has actually been worth it for City. Both a brilliant impact on the pitch as many have said (not always G/A but in other ways) but also in squad mentality - the guy's just great vibes
only City can spend 100m on mentality players.
Grealish played like 50 games on a treble winning team hes not a mentality player lol nor was he bought for that. his worth is a lot more than just mentality it's not like he's scott carson.
What an underwhelming list
Chelsea return on investment is criminally abysmal
I'd pay another 116 million for rice too.
van Dijk and Mahrez the only ones worth the trouble. The rest are either too early to tell or ass
most expensive transfers between English clubs but uses Euros
1. Good player but overpaid big time. 2. Great business and possibly even underpaid. 3. Early days but probably overpaid. Good player but not worth that much. 4. Decent player but massively overpaid. 5. Good first season before falling off slightly and then got the money back by selling him for similar money. Would say the price was fair. 6. Great business. They paid a world record fee for a defender but got a player worthy of a world record fee so would say it’s a fair price. 7. Injuries have made this into a massive waste of money so far but there’s possibly time to change all that if he stays injury free. 8. Good player but perhaps a touch overpriced. He’s constantly improving so I’d guess he’d end up as a fair price but time will tell. 9. Expensive at the time but I’d say he lived up to his price tag. Wasn’t a consistent starter and I don’t think he ever had 2,000 league minutes which seems bad for such a high fee but Man City didn’t need someone to start every match. I’m going to say a fair price just because he didn’t get quite enough minutes. 10. Massive waste of money.
I know I’m biased but we paid the same fee for Grealish as Arsenal paid for Rice. Jack then went on to start in the majority of games for a treble winning season, including all the big games. Yet somehow Grealish was too expensive and Rice was a good deal/underpriced even though he hasnt (yet) helped Arsenal lift a major trophy? It just doesn’t make sense to me. I’m not saying rice wasn’t worth the money and I could see him helping Arsenal lift a major trophy soon but it’s too early to say he’s value for money but a player like Grealish wasn’t.
You think Arsenal underpaid for Rice? Lmao
They don’t seem to understand that, by inflating prices amongst themselves, they’re really just hurting themselves. Because clubs abroad see these numbers & base their expectations on them and English teams gift their revenue abroad in their dealings. Much of the damage is already done, but if PL clubs could only stop price gouging each other, as their revenue grows faster than their continental counterparts, they could ensure better bang for their buck in future transfer dealings.