Tweet
With the NON FFO auction in the books, as per usual there were winners and losers. We now look back at the clubs who were ‘winners’ by making a steal, and ‘losers’ who could have either won a player with a smarter bid, or saved a lot of money had they held their nerve.
Winners:
Eintract Frankfurt-
Frankfurt secured the services of 26 year old Spanish defender S_Reguilon for £40,000,001. As the only bidder, the German outfit landed Reguilon quite easily and given the Frankfurt manager’s intentions to sell him and use the money to fund his youth system, that’s £40,000,001 well spent.
Sheffield Wednesday-
Some may recall E_Haaland landing in Sheffield a few seasons ago as manager Mike Bradwell pulled off one of, if not, the greatest auction bids of all time.
Haaland was later sold in a multi player swap deal which has seen Wednesday go from strength to strength and has helped to establish them as a Premier League team.
This time, at the last minute, the South Yorkshire team landed yet another young player with a bright future in 19 year old Austrian passing defender L_Querfeld. The teenager who can pass as well as defend it seems will be a handy player for the Owls unless they choose to send him out on loan. No news out of the Wednesday camp as of yet but Querfeld is certainly one with a bright future.
Barnsley-
The Tykes landed 23 year old defensive midfielder C_Doucoure from the auction in a deal worth £35,900,001 which will help boost their survival hopes under new, old manager Anthony Harris. With Doucoure being young and very talented he should slot right into the Barnsley team and be a key player for them next season.
Tottenham Hotspur-
A £45,000,000 bid from Tottenham would turn out to be the only bid that L_Bailey received but it was the only bid the 26 year old Jamaican needed. Managerless Spurs needed something to pick themselves off the ground after manager Thomas Edvardsen left the club just days before the auction and that’s exactly what Bailey will provide.
The talented attacking midfielder will boss the Spurs midfield and under the right manager he could become one of the best midfielders in the game.
Now we move onto the losers, these 4 losers are for different reasons. Some may not see them as losers while others may agree.
Real Madrid-
The defending EFL 1 champions Real Madrid splashed the cash, dropping £220,000,000 on 21 year old N_Williams.
The Frenchman joined Los Blancos after newly appointed manager Ian Greaves spent the majority of the war chest he was left behind by former Madrid manager Steve Talbot.
While Williams is an excellent player, A) Was he worth £220,000,000?
B) The Real Madrid bid was the only bid that Williams received, had Greaves channelled his inner Andy Banks and bid the minimum bid of £30,000,000 he could have saved almost £200,000,000!
Juventus-
Juventus ended up with egg on their face after round 1 after they failed to secure defender M_Guehi as he fell into the hands of PSG and Simon Clark.
Banks and Juventus had the funds to outbid the £105,000,000+ bid from Paris but they chose not to, instead looking to save their money while securing a world class defender at the same time. Money will come and go but players like Guehi aren’t easy to find so we think that Juventus will see this as a missed opportunity, in time if they don’t already.
Chelsea-
From one former Real Madrid manager to another, Steve Talbot missed out on striker M_Rashford by almost £30,000,000 in round 1 as he joined Liverpool and Graeme Edwards. Talbot bid around £67,000,000 despite having more than double that amount, another auction tactic gone wrong similarly to Banks at Juventus.
Round 2 would see the 6 time EFL 1 champion land 25 year old Portuguese wingback D_Dalot for a little under £100,000,000 but in this case, he could have bid almost £70,000,000 less as the only team to bid on Dalot would be Chelsea.
Will Chelsea see this as a waste of £70,000,000? Or money well spent on a very talented and still young player?
Lazio-
After missing out on M_Rashford in round 1 by a painful £250,000, Lazio would look to shake things up by bidding on a goalkeeper, G_Restes, in round 2, a position that was already filled, and not only filled but M_Maignan is the current Lazio captain for the first half of the season.
Some have questioned Fields’ motivation for signing a second goalkeeper and some have questioned if Restes will play for Lazio or if he’ll be sold for a profit after the club shelled out almost £60,000,000 on the teenager or if the club are willing to play Restes and bench Maignan until the mid way point of the season before selling the 30 year old. Either way, Fields & Lazio are stuck with Maignan for a few months now.
Juventus manager Andy Banks’ response to being in our ‘biggest losers’ list;
“I’m sure the footballing world is laughing at it, BUT, we weren’t too keen on Guehi. He’s a brilliant talent but as we’ve said before it would have caused us other issues so we’re happy to spend a small amount of our transfer budget this time on S_Vos and send him out on loan to look towards the future.
Had we spent £150,000,000-160,000,000 and we could have got him for £30,000,000 I personally would be even more gutted so it’s not that bad is it. We’ll just have to make sure we’re on the winners list next time, hopefully.”
Comment