The Harsh Reality Of High Transfer Fees In Football

Ever since Roman Abramovich spent his first million on Chelsea Football Club, it’s become a common sight to see Chelsea spend large (sometimes extravagant) sums on top-quality players. Many people chided the club for spending so lavishly on players, but it’s not something that ever bothered Roman or the Chelsea fans. When Roman bought the club, the finances of the club were in shambles to say the least. It was a relief to quite a few that the club was still in operation. Hence, no one really complained (let’s be honest, why would they?) when Roman left no stone unturned to ensure that the club became one of the biggest clubs not only in England, but also in Europe and the whole world.

During the summer of 2011, Liverpool (continuing with their policy of buying the best English talent available) spent £20M each on Stewart Downing and Jordan Henderson. Again, both were classic cases of over-spending. Downing is a half-decent old-fashioned English winger who likes a good cross, but he was never worth £20M. Henderson showed signs of promise at Sunderland, but (yet again) not enough to warrant such a lavish fee. Downing ended the 2011/12 League season with 0 goals and 0 assists. Henderson didn’t fare much better. Clearly, this shows us that transfer fees can be ridiculously inflated in some cases. In most cases though, players justify their price-tags. Sergio Aguero is a perfect example, as well as Radamel Falcao. Juan Mata is another such example.

One must also look at the fact that the sport of football has changed as a whole. With the game now watched in almost every corner of the world, the money involved is a lot more than what it was even 20 years back. TV & sponsorship deals are now an added source of income for clubs, as well as the sale of football jerseys. With so much money at stake, it’s no surprise that transfer fees have skyrocketed. And it’s something that the big-men of football (namely FIFA, UEFA etc.) accept. UEFA’s Financial Fair Play rules aim to curb excessive spending, but the loophole is this: the club can spend as much money as they want as long as they are profitable. It may not seem like much of a loophole given that most top European clubs are in some sort of debt at the moment, but if clubs can find more sources of income and become profitable enterprises, they can still spend good amounts of money on player transfers.

As such, managers and fans can talk about these transfer fees till they go blue in the face; they may feel it that it gives an unfair advantage to some; they may even argue that more should be done to curb transfer prices so as to avoid a situation when clubs will be paying even larger sums in the future. But the harsh reality is this: high transfer fees are here to stay.

Shayne

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