Football finance expert explains controversial Chelsea and Aston Villa transfers as Premier League rivals 'consider action'

A football finance expert has explained the reasoning behind swap deal transfers between Premier League clubs at the beginning of the transfer window.

Aston Villa are closing in on the signing of Chelsea left-back Ian Maatsen, who spent the second half of last season on loan at Borussia Dortmund, for a fee of £37.5 million.

Going the other way will be Villa youngster Omari Kellyman, who is set to join Chelsea for a fee of £19 million.

Meanwhile, Villa have also signed Lewis Dobbin from Everton, with Tim Iroegbunam going the other way in a separate deal. Both players are believed to have cost £10 million each.

Notably, all four players are academy graduates from their respective clubs - effectively meaning their sales are recorded as pure profit when it comes to meeting Financial Fair Play (FFP) regulations. For non-academy graduates, the sale is often recorded in instalments over the length of a player's contract with their new club.

There were also reports that Newcastle and Everton were in talks over a potential deal involving Yankuba Minteh and Dominic Calvert-Lewin, although the Magpies were unwilling to meet Everton's valuation for Calvert-Lewin.

Speaking to i, football finance expert Kieran Maguire has given his verdict over the purpose of the transfers, which largely centres around the accounting year-end date of June 30.

"These are mutually beneficial transfers," he began, "In the sense we have five or six clubs who ideally want to get a profit from some source before June 30.

"Let's say we've got two clubs with players worth £8 million and £10 million respectively, who are promising players but don't have much experience.

"You could swap those two players with a cash transfer of £2 million from one club to the other. If we assume those two players are academy players, one team books a profit of £8 million and the other books £10 million."

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He continued: "What could be happening instead is both clubs are saying, 'Let's make it £18 million and £20 million, and the cash transfer is still £2 million but we're booking much bigger profits'. And it just so happens that those profits are just enough to keep you inside the PSR [Profit and Sustainability Regulations] limit."

BBC Sport claim that the transfer deals have 'annoyed' rival Premier League clubs, with an unnamed side said to be 'so concerned it intends to raise the matter' with Premier League officials.

It is stressed that the transfers are not breaking any league rules, with questions instead centred around the valuations and whether they highlight a potential loophole in the PSR regulations.

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