The transfer window is now in full swing, and several
notable transfers have already taken place.
Some of the most notable players to have changed clubs
thus far include Jorginho, who has left Napoli for Chelsea; Gianluigi Buffon,
who went from Juventus to Paris Saint-Germain; Riyad Mahrez, who finally maded
his long-anticipated move from Leicester to Manchester City; and of course,
Cristiano Ronaldo, whose transfer from Real Madrid to Juventus stunned the
football world and even managed to temporarily take its focus away from the
World Cup.
However, on many an occasion, it has not been the
blockbuster transfers that have had the most impact on the season to come, but
rather, the transfers that were initially greeted by little fanfare, but
subsequently turned out to change the course of the season, and sometimes
multiple seasons thereafter as well.
For example, during last off-season’s transfer window,
the most talked-about transfers that hogged all the attention included the
following: Álvaro Morata leaving Real Madrid for Chelsea, Romelu Lukaku’s
transfer from Everton to Manchester United, and of course, Neymar’s
record-breaking move from Barcelona to Paris Saint-Germain, which, as far as
the transfer market itself is concerned, fundamentally altered the transfer
market forever.
However, in terms of the impact a signing made on his new
team, by far the most impactful signing of the transfer window was that of
Mohamed Salah, who left Roma to join Liverpool in a move that was largely
overlooked by many.
Salah went on to prove the folly of those who
underestimated him by playing an incredible season marked by his scoring 32
league goals, leading Liverpool to the Champions League final, and winning a
bevy of individual awards, including Premier League Player of the Season, PFA
Players’ Player of the Year, FWA Footballer of the Year, and African Footballer
of the Year.
On the other hand, Morata’s season was so poor that he
missed Spain’s World Cup squad, Neymar missed a large portion of the season
with a foot injury, and while Lukaku did have a solid season, it was nowhere
near the level of Salah’s.
This phenomenon has occurred before.
In the mid-season transfer window of 2011, several
transfers which generated tremendous amounts of hype were made. Chief among
them were the signings of Fernando Torres and Andy Carroll, who moved from
Liverpool to Chelsea and Newcastle to Liverpool respectively. The immense buzz
that accompanied these transfers caused Manchester City’s signing of Edin Džeko
from Wolfsburg to be overshadowed.
However, circumstances would play out in the exact
opposite manner that one would expect, given how much hype each of these
signings received.
Neither Torres nor Carroll ever really adapted well to
life at their new clubs, and both soon entered a terminal decline. On the other
hand, throughout his tenure at City, Džeko was a key contributor, scoring 50 league
goals and helping City win two league titles before departing for Roma in 2015.
Džeko scored more goals over this period than Torres and Carroll combined.
Several of the world’s best players today were once
under-the-radar signings as well. Not many had heard of N’Golo Kanté in 2015,
Diego Costa in 2010, or Mats Hummels in 2009; however, all three went on to
make major contributions to their new clubs: Leicester, Atlético Madrid, and
Borussia Dortmund respectively.
It takes a shrewd team to figure out which players who
have been slept on and overlooked are ready to make the jump and become a key
contributor on a top team. Many under-the-radar signings who succeed and make
significant impacts were selected based on careful scouting, thorough
evaluation, and knowledge about how they would fit into their new team.
Conversely, in the examples already provided about hyped
transfers of players who never quite reached the expected levels, the clubs who
signed these players went directly for the “star names” without considering the
context, or how each player would fit into the team.
As the transfer window carries on, there will surely be
more big-name transfers to come which will attract all the headlines. However,
do not overlook supposedly “lesser” signings, because some team out there might
have just unearthed a true gem who turns out to be the missing piece they
needed all along.
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