Southampton's £50m raid of Man City academy sets new transfer benchmark

Southampton are almost single-handedly finding Manchester City's academy sales these days.

Last year, they spent around £40m on four players who had just two senior appearances for City between them. Both belonged to Romeo Lavia, while Republic of Ireland international Gavin Bazunu had two years of League One football behind him, but nothing higher. Sam Edozie and Juan Larios were solely tested in the academy arena, rather than at first-team level.

Still, Southampton splashed the cash, and City were £40m richer to help fund their summer business. This year, Southampton have continued the City recruitment theme by securing Blues Head of Academy Jason Wilcox to be their Director of Football, youngster Josh McNamara for their under-21 team, and now U21 captain Shea Charles.

An eight-time Northern Ireland international, Charles only made his senior club debut in the final game of the season at Brentford, yet that is enough to see him valued at £10.5m.

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Southampton will take their spending on City players to over £50m in two summers, with Charles' fee potentially rising to £15m. Add the £15m fee Burnley are set to pay for goalkeeper James Trafford - another player with no experience higher than League One - and there is now a benchmark for how much City's best academy prospects will cost.

Going further back, Lukas Nmecha and Angus Gunn have also brought in fees around the £10m mark, while Darko Gyabi cost Leeds around £5m last summer. It's fair, then, to say that City's best academy talents are worth between £5-10m these days, rising for the more promising players, and also taking homegrown status into account.

While Southampton were in the