Europe’s 10 Most Overpriced Transfers; Or: Prem Transfer Roundup.

By: chris | September 5th, 2008

Sadly, we could’ve turned this thing into an all-Prem list, but did our best to look elsewhere. Didn’t turn out so well. The problem is so many sums paid in the Premiership dwarf that of those in other leagues – Serie A, Bundesliga, La Liga, Ligue 1, etc. – that it can make their normally overpriced fees look halfway decent. But it just doesn’t change the fact that the Premiership’s revenue has driven up their prices to a place which in unseen anywhere in Europe. “Value” is just not a word which you can find in abundance in England.

Robinho, Man City (£32.5m): I guess you could call this a drop in the bucket for his new owners, but still, is Robinho worth 40m? To paraphrase Peter Kenyon: Fuck no. He’s good, but he is certainly not as great as this week’s coverage makes him appear to be, and he’s certainly not worthy of being the highest paid footballer in the world. Not that this will matter in January when Man City buys United out and makes it their reserve team. (Kidding…..but they can.)

Marouane Fellaini, Everton (£15m): Let this be a lesson to all ye prospective sporting directors out there: don’t wait until the very last minute to try and make a huge buy unless you’ve just been bought out by guys who bath in crude oil – and especially don’t do it after the kid’s had a good int’l tournament. Nothing inflates prices unnecessarily like organized tournaments.

And how about that unibrow?

Robbie Keane, Liverpool (£20.3m): Robbie Keane’s a good player. £20m good? Nay.

Dani Alves, Barca (€30m): Dani Alves is, without question, a great player. No debating that. Hard not to love watch him play as well. However, fullbacks aren’t usually a gamechanging force. €30m is a lot of scratch and the right talent evaluators could buy a very competitive team for that much dough. Good purchase, but still, that’s a lot of money for a guy whose impact on the whole may not match up.

Peter Crouch, Portsmouth (£11m): There are things in Peter Crouch’s life worth paying £11m for. Abigail Clancy is one. Peter Crouch is not.

Posthumous Gareth Barry, Liverpool (£18m): If he was Norwegian, Rafa could’ve had him for €6m and a bag of pistachios. That’s all I’m saying.

David Bentley, Tottenham (£15m): Daryl explained it awhile back here.

Paul Robinson, Blackburn (£3.5m): Coming as a complete shock to no one, 3 weeks in Blackburn have conceded the most goals in the Premier League at 7. During those games Paul Robinson has saved 5. That’s not a particularly good ratio…

Philippe Senderos, Milan (Loan): Because they’re paying him a wage every week and because it devalues Maldini and Nesta to have to play alongside him – especially if it’s Maldini’s final season. It’s like if Baresi spent his final year playing alongside Titus Bramble.

Ricardo Quaresma, Inter (€18.6m + Pele): This one’s not so much about the money or talent as it is about Pele – a bona fide rising star – and the fact that Quaresma is a bit, uh, lazy. Greg from the Portugal Offside summed it up nicely:

Given Quaresma’s past failure at Barcelona, I’m surprised Porto were able to hold Inter up for that type of payment and the level of player that Pelé is. While I love Quaresma’s ability and think he has the skill set to be all world, he seems to take whole matches off at a time. He’s shown that he can track back and defend his position somewhat, but those instances are few and far between.

Plus he’s got that whole incessant whining thing going on, which won’t endear him to anyone in Serie A and really helps fill out that Cristiano Ronaldo Lite comparison. If he matures, it’s a good buy, but he’s soon to be 25 and he should be there mentally by now.

There were a couple non-Prem honorable mentions, however:

Danny Alves, Zenit St. Petersburg (€30m): Simply haven’t seen enough of him to make a sound judgment.

Miralem Sulejmani, Ajax (€16.5m): €16.5m seems like a ton, but he was incredibly impressive at times last year for Heerenveen at only 18. Could be a bit much right now, but might turn out to be a sound buy in a few years.