The summer transfer window has officially slammed shut and boy was it a busy few months in the Premier League. Almost £2 billion was splurged by English top-flight teams this year with many of the transfer fees, while undoubtedly spent on top, top players, leaving fans to think: ‘is he really worth that much?’ Take Manchester United signing Antony, for example; he’s a thoroughly exciting player who could go onto be a real success in the Premier League, but should the Red Devils really have parted with £85.5 million for his services?
At the end of the day, almost everyone would agree that United paid over the odds to get the deal done, but overpaying isn’t always necessarily a bad thing in the beautiful game.
Let’s face it, Liverpool paid more for Virgil van Dijk than anyone thought they should have done at the time, but that once brazen-looking £75 million fee has since been made to look like loose change down the back of the sofa.
All this is to say that overpaying in the transfer window can either be a forward-thinking masterstroke or a world-class way of burning money.