In hindsight it’s probably the worst ever transfer. But to cut us a little slack, Lukaku has been a dominant goal scorer at Inter just before he moved to us. After his United disaster where he was out of shape and sulking, by the time he was on his way back to Chelsea he had slimmed down and was in the form of his career.
Why stop there? Maguire, Antony, Sancho and PogbaLukaku
Who exactly was saying at that time that he was 6 months from becoming a 120 million player. Being highly rated and being rated so highly to command one of the biggest transfer fees ever are completely different things.
Are you out of your mind??
Yeah would be nice if they cited a source! Also could be something as silly as not accounting for differences in exchange rates at the time - I had it in my head that Pogba was €105m so it seems entirely possible they've just typed that into google now and not bothered looking up the correct conversion rate.
It was just bizarre that you signed him and then utilised him in the completely wrong way.
That's fair. But still. I thought at best he'd be 17/18 Lukaku and it just didn't make sense. To me it was always him just moving to an easier league and having less pressure as the reason for his success at Inter compared to United. So when he went to Chelsea I figured he would at best be 17/18 United version of Lukaku which is still a flop... The most impressive part of that deal is how quickly Tuchel moved on from him tbh. Usually pretty hard to move on from a 100m player.
I blame FDJ, we badly need a new midfielder and waiting FDJ all summer until he fecked us up. We then quickly move on to another big signing Casemro, who is by the way a great signing. But we simply just let pass the chance to take Enzo for peanuts.
I got a brain tumour reading that calculation. Since when are we calculating transfers like that . Maguire isn’t that bad this year because what CB can you get for 15 million this year
Can't discount racism either
Who is making these sorts of specific predictions and why is that necessary? Has every great player ever been highly rated as a teenager?
Yep most definitely - there was a lot of shite spouted about Pogba's "pace and power" when his standout quality to me was always elegance.
Yeah would rate Casa as one of our best midfield signings since Keano which I know is big call,in terms of Fernandez like you say we took eye off ball chasing De Jong and paid for it.
There was no hindsight needed. To bring Lukaku into a team who liked to press high, have good link up and fluid movement was moronic and always going to look as silly as did.
Erm of course we can
Very true
Isn’t it just.
Most transfer fee are paid in installments, very few are paid upfront. Examples are Maguire, Ronaldo (to Madrid).
That's an absolutely ridiculous calculation. Most transfers aren't been paid upfront and he just became what he is. In the top 5 transfer fees of all-time or a whooping €121 million. That's the amount that Chelsea is gonna pay for him, period.
He should be for that money. He cost Chelsea double what we paid for Lisandro.
He would want to be at double the cost!
I guarantee he won't.
I have nearly that much in my wallet right now - sounds like a bargain to me!
Fixed
I don't see what all the hubbub is about if we're only spending 121 pounds on this guyFixed
While there's a lot of baloney in that list by whoever came up with it - the top 10 were and are, with only 1 exception (Douglas Luiz), all excellent players and remain near enough the best players in their age group. In fact if you focus on the top 10, those who the compiler of the list would have most likely considered to be dead-certs, then there's a 90% hit-rate - suggesting it's not actually that much of "a crapshoot".
Who are some of these CMs who were rated higher at the time?
I think we're more or less in agreement here - it's not that it's hard to identify true talent when it's spotted, but not being on one of these lists or being low-ranked isn't some sort of death-knell for a career.
So many transfers already are already paid in instalments over a number of years. This isn't new. The fee is the fee regardless of the structure.
If they are near the top of that list they're normally not £30 million at the start
What if he's great for 2 seasons and it only cost them £45 million to that point? Clearly thats a good deal. It doesnt mean that at the end of the 5 years it'll have been a good deal.
We didnt pay £30 million for Maguire at the start
Doesn't really matter though, does it? You still pay the full amount in the end?
I don't get this. If I buy a new BMW for 50k on finance, I can't go around saying "Look at this amazing car that only cost me 10k". Because that's not true. The car still cost me 50k, even if I've only paid 10k so far.
What you're describing doesn't really make sense from an accounting perspective - the way the books are structured and maintained doesn't typically reflect the actual cash flow in and out of the club.
