Back in the summer everyone had their tipping point in the transfer window, "the games gone because player X cost £y million." Before inflation and the blowing up of prices players obviously went for much less but how much would they have gone for?
You may be aware, probably because I've mentioned it in over a million articles, but Neymar went to PSG for £198 million in the summer. That fee made what was already an expensive transfer window go astronomical.
The Neymar deal meant that the largest fee ever paid for a player jumped from €100 million to over €200 million and sent everyone into a frenzy of spending.
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No transfer at the moment is likely to get near that but the spending isn't going to end any time soon. Of course when life was black and white footballers only cost a load of balls and some training cones but what if the past came to the future?
The lads at giffgaff worked out how much a player would be worth now based on their statistics from yesteryear and compared with similar players of today. So Pele gets compared to Neymar for example:
Pele- £351 million. Got to be honest this one seems like a stretch but the Brazilian striker is one of the best players of all time. The fact he'd scored 515 times by the age of 25 makes him worth more than Neymar. The fact all his goals were in Brazil probably means this wouldn't quite be the case,
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Possibly the best striker of all time? Image: PA
Johan Cruyff - £242 million. For the purposes of this exercise the Dutch master has been compared to Arsenal's Alexandre Lacazette, yeah that seems harsh on the Gunner. His goals by age of 26 and two Ballon d'Ors make him worth so much which is fair but why Lacazette?
Oliver Khan- £13 million. Right so there maybe a huge flaw in giffgaffs calculations here, no offence guys the work is great but...Khan is being compared to Jordan Pickford and because he has less clean sheets than the Englishman at the same age he's worth so much less, not buying it. But Khan at that price is a snip.
George Best- £157 million. Another one where we feel sorry for the modern player. Best is compared to Gylfi Sigurdsson. One is one of the greatest players ever to have graced the earth, the other is Iceland's best ever player and the man whose transfer fee annoyed people than anyone else's.
Simply the best. Image: PA
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Paolo Maldini- £111 million. Based on his beautiful looks alone this seems fair. He's compared to Kyle Walker but in fairness to the former Spurs man Maldini would be worth this no matter what the comparison.
Diego Maradona- £94 million. In the 'Ronaldo or Messi' of a bygone era debate the fact that Maradona comes in at such a lesser price to Pele's will be cause for lots of argument. Romelu Lukaku if anyone cares.
So it seems the players of back in the day were all better at their age and worth more than the modern equivalents
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