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With COVID-19 wreaking havoc on the financial world, football clubs, business behemoths themselves, have endured a torrid time in the last few months. In such a scenario, clubs have been keen to snap up talented free agents to bolster their squads and keep their books in the black.
With money in short supply, clubs are also willing to let targets run down their contracts and become free agents before making a move for them. However, even in a world where high-profile free agents are a precious commodity, quite a few of them are yet to find a club and remain unattached to one as we approach the January transfer window.
The reasons for the same vary in the capricious world of football. World Cup star Danijel Subasic's value has suddenly dropped while big clubs are also wary of touching former hot property Mario Balotelli, with the player having developed a reputation for volatility.
Ten most valuable free agents at the moment:
In a season unlike any other, clubs have suffered from injury issues due to fixture pile-ups, a situation that could result in many of these free agents finding new homes soon.
Many free agents currently available still have a hefty market value engendered by their previous reputations. On that note, let us take a look at the ten most valuable free agents currently available.
#10 Kevin Stewart - €2.8 million
Once a Liverpool midfielder, Kevin Stewart never managed to hold down a permanent spot in a Premier League team.
He made the move to Championship side Hull City last season. However, after Hull got relegated, Stewart was let go by the club, and the 27-year-old is yet to find a new home yet.
#9 Mario Balotelli - €3 million
Once one of the most coveted young strikers of Europe, Mario Balotelli's fall from grace has been striking. A proven performer with Italy and a continental treble-winner with Inter Milan, Super Mario also won the Premier League with Manchester City.
Balotelli scored regularly for most of his clubs, but he was often accused of indiscipline and quite often got into unseemly off-field controversies.
He did fail at Liverpool but regained his mojo to some extent at Nice. However, his reputation took a gradual nosedive over the years, and he was no longer being courted by the biggies. Balotelli's last spell was at hometown club Brescia, who got relegated to Serie B, and the automatic renewal clause in his contract was thus not activated.
Balotelli's contract with the club was eventually terminated when the striker did not turn up for training. It is expected that he could find a new club in the winter transfer window, but at only 30, he is a pale shadow of the striker who helped Italy reach the Euro 2012 final.
Italy coach Roberto Mancini recently rued the situation of his former protege Balotelli:
"I am very sorry to see him in this condition. At the age of 30, he should be in full technical football maturity and would have been very useful to the national team."
#8 Daryl Janmaat - €3 million
Daryl Janmaat is a player who is already heavily linked with a top club under duress due to an unforeseen injury crisis.
It has been reported that Liverpool, already bereft of the services of inspirational centrr-back Vi€gil Van Dijk and now sweating on the fitness of Joe Gomez and Trent Alexander-Arnold, with other big names also out, are about to offer the versatile Dutch defender Daryl Janmaat a contract.
Janmaat, an international with his country, last played for Watford. He has also played for Newcastle United in the Premier League before.
#7 Wilfried Bony - €3.2 million
The descent of Ivorian striker Wilfried Bony, once Africa's most expensive player, has been very striking.
Bony first rose to prominence in England at Swansea after being a top marksman in the Netherlands. He was then immediately snapped up by Manchester City. but he had a stop-start spell at the Etihad and hardly showed the potency that had made City pick him up in the first place.
A loan spell to Stoke City and a return to Swansea hardly redeemed matters. The Africa Cup of Nations' winner's last club was Al-Ittihad in Saudi Arabia. Bony's contract with that club was mutually terminated by both parties earlier this month.
#6 Alexandre Pato - €3.5 million
It is par for the course for Alexandre Pato to find a mention on a list teeming with bright strikers who burnt out too soon. Termed a generational talent who moved to AC Milan at 17 from Internacional, Pato hit the ground running in Italy in what was the purple patch in his career.
Though he scored 63 times for Milan and won the Serie A as part of a great team, injuries plagued his later years at the club. His playboy image also impacted his career, and despite two good spells, one at Sao Paolo and the other at Tianjin Tianhai in China, Pato's career generally went backwards since his Milan high.
Fitness has remained an issue for Pato in high-profile failures at Chelsea and Villareal, with his last spell at Sao Paulo ending with his contract getting mutually terminated.
Once compared with the great Ronaldo Nazario, Pato hasn't played for Brazil in ages. Rumour has it that Pato might be headed to either Monza or Birmingham Ciy.
#5 Kwadwo Asamoah - €4 million
The ever-changing world of football has ensured that six-time Serie A winner Kwadwo Asamoah finds himself without a club at 31.
The Ghanaian left midfielder won his Scudetto titles and four Italian Cups with Juventus but endured a frustrating spell at Inter Milan, where he failed to pin down a first-team spot.
With Asamoah making over 150 appearances for the Bianconeri, it will be surprising if he doesn't find a new home soon.
#4 Fabio Borini - €4 million
Much-travelled Italian striker Fabio Borini has had spells at Liverpool, AC Milan, Chelsea and Parma but is without a club since leaving Hellas Verona. Reports suggest that the Italy international might be about to be handed a lifeline by Turkish side Goztepe soon.
The 29-year-old Borini has been training alone after becoming a free agent in Merseyside. He was part of the same Italian team with which Balotelli finished runners-up in Euro 2012.
#3 Jack Wilshere - €4 million
Once the darling of England and Arsenal, creative midfielder Jack Wilshere surprisingly finds himself without a club at 28.
Wilshere became a senior player for the Gunners in 2008-09 and was once tipped to captain the club by Arsene Wenger, but injuries played their part in the extremely talented player's downfall.
The player has not rediscovered his mojo since becoming a peripheral presence at Arsenal, whose then coach Unai Emery let him go in 2017-18. As it turned out, Wilshere's last spell at West Ham was a colossal disappointment for both parties.
Jack Wilshere's former teammate Cesc Fabregas was awestruck by the former's talent when the playmaker first burst on to the scene as a precocious teenager against Barcelona in the Champions League. The Spanish midfielder told The Daily Mail in this regard:
“He was just 16 when he first came to train with us, and I was like “wow this guy is good, strong, sharp. It’s a big shame what has happened to him. I feel sorry because he could have been a proper English legend of the game.”
#2 Daniel Sturridge - €4 million
Daniel Sturridge won the Premier League with Chelsea and the Champions League with Liverpool and was one of the top strikers of the English game for almost a decade. He scored 60 goals for the Reds and 24 goals for the Blues in over 250 combined appearances for both clubs.
However, things took a turn for the bizarre and the worse simultaneously when he moved to Turkey and joined Trabzonspor.
Sturridge left them by mutual agreement after playing 16 times for the club and was then slapped with a four-month worldwide ban due to betting regulation violations. He has been without a club since, but one gets the feeling that he could be back with a new club soon.
#1 Ahmed Musa - €6 million
The Nigerian national team skipper Ahmed Musa, who is head and shoulders above the rest on this list in terms of his market value, finds himself without a club at 28 after being released by Al-Nassr last month.
The wide attacker came into the limelight at CSKA Moscow for whom he played 184 times and won quite a few trophies.
However, his downfall began after switching to then-Premier League champions Leicester City in 2016. Musa only found the net five times in 33 games for the English club before a loan move saw him back to Moscow.
Reports suggest that a move to Turkey is imminent for the third-most capped player for the Super Eagles, with whom he won the Africa Cup of Nations in 2013.
