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The Premier League is one of the biggest leagues in terms of the revenue generated, in football, and these massive revenues make the Premier League clubs the richest in football. The Premier League clubs have thrown huge sums of money to sign players and there have been mixed results.
Some signings have proven to be very good decisions, like Mohamed Salah; but there are a few players who have struggled to live up to their hefty price tags, like Alvaro Morata. Here in this slideshow, we take a look at the worst bys of the Premier League campaign 2017-18-
Chelsea and Everton had horrendous transfer windows as the players they signed failed to showcase their potential, and hence quite a few of their players make this list.
Names lucky to miss out:
-- Sandro Ramirez
-- Fernando Llorente
-- Ross Barkley
-- Danny Drinkwater
-- Wilfried Bony
#10 Joe Hart (West Ham United) - Loan
What a steep fall Joe Hart has seen since Pep Guardiola's arrival at Manchester City forced him out of the club. After an unconvincing spell out on loan at Torino, Guardiola knew that he couldn't depend on Hart if he had to have genuine hopes of making a title challenge. He brought in Ederson from Benfica, and once again sent the England keeper out on loan, this time to West Ham United.
Hart’s spell at the London Stadium has been nothing short of a nightmare and he was even dropped for Adrian midway through the campaign after a number of high-profile errors. West Ham conceded a shocking 39 goals in the 19 games that Hart started in goal and it translated to just 3 wins.
Hart has unfortunately suffered such a sharp decline in form that he has also been ignored by Gareth Southgate in the 23-man England squad for the World Cup, despite being the most experienced player available to be selected.
#9 Kevin Wimmer (Stoke City) - £18 million
Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy has often been praised for his shrewd transfer negotiation skills, as he has always managed to make opposition teams to pay over the odds to buy his players. However, even he must be wondering how he managed to get Stoke City to agree to pay £18 million for a player whom Spurs wanted out of the club
Belgian centre-back Kevin Wimmer, featured regularly in the first half of the season and he was a part of the defence that conceded 32 goals in just 17 appearances, where they could just manage to keep one clean sheet.
He didn't feature in the Premier League in the final four months of the campaign. Stoke suffered relegation at the end of the campaign due to a leaky defence which conceded the most number of goals in the season, a gap they failed to plug after the poor signing of Wimmer.
#8 Michael Keane (Everton) - £25 million
Michael Keane was signed by Everton for £25 million after a breakthrough campaign for Burnley. However, like most of Everton's summer signings, he's failed to perform to the levels expected of him. It has looked as if the price tag has weighed heavily on him as he has looked nervous for most of the campaign, with the composure displayed at Turf Moor missing.
He has clearly regressed since his move to the Merseyside club and he will hope to have a much better campaign next time around. Keane's replacement at Burnley, James Tarkowski, has had a spectacular season and was even named as one of the six nominees for the Premier League Player of the Season.
Tarkowski also took Keane's place in the England national team during the previous international break and the latter will hope that he is on the final 23-man squad that will head to Russia.
#7 Alvaro Morata (Chelsea) - £60 million
After a controversial but extremely successful stint at Chelsea, Diego Costa was sold back to Atletico Madrid and fellow Spaniard Alvaro Morata was signed as his replacement from Real Madrid for £60 million. The club-record signing got off to a great start to the campaign by contributing to 9 goals and 4 assists in just 14 appearances as Chelsea were comfortably placed in the top 3.
The turn of the year saw a drastic change in fortunes for the club, their manager, and Morata himself, as they went through a prolonged spell of bad form. He has managed just one goal in League appearances since December 30, surely nowhere close to what Chelsea expected from their club-record signing striker.
Morata's struggles were best epitomized by the golden opportunities that he squandered during January's 2-2 draw with Arsenal, apart from the numerous other decent chances that he has missed in other games.
Though he's an extremely good header of the ball, various traits of his play have been criticized by fans and pundits alike, including his movement, ball control and decision-making. Morata seems ill-suited to the rigors of the Premier League and Chelsea are looking to offload him at a huge loss, with former club Juventus the favorites to sign him once again.
Morata also faces a nervous wait to see if he'll be named in Spain's World Cup squad, purely based on reputation as his form has deserted him this year.
#6 Guido Carrillo (Southampton) - £19.2 million
With Shane Long and Manolo Gabbiadini enduring poor campaigns, and Charlie Austin struggling with injuries, Southampton needed a striker who was capable of scoring goals.
Southampton though seemed to have developed an unfortunate habit of signing strikers just as their goal scoring form begins to desert them. Guido Carrillo was signed for £19.2 million from Monaco in January, a risky sum for a striker who has never been a prolific goal scorer.
The risk hasn't paid off as the 26-year-old didn't find the net in any of the 7 games that he appeared in this season. Southampton barely scraped ahead of Swansea in the final round to avoid relegation and the Saints will hope that their expensive striker can find form next season, otherwise, they would have to take a hit on the investment they made to offload him elsewhere.
#5 Andre Gray (Watford) - £18.2 million
Burnley were criticized for their decision to sell Andre Gray in the summer, who was signed by Watford for a club record fee of £18.2 million. It was expected that Burnley would struggle without their front-man but Gray's new club were the ones who found the going tough this year.
The English forward contributed just 5 goals and 4 assists despite being available for the majority of the campaign; disappointing numbers for a club record signing.
With the likes of Troy Deeney and Stefano Okaka struggling to score goals, it was expected that Gray would be their problem solver. Though his link-up play and touches in front of goal were decent, he was guilty of missing good chances at important moments. Watford will hope that Gray has a better second season to solve their striker woes.
#4 Renato Sanches (Swansea City) - Loan
With heavy competition for places at Bayern Munich, Renato Sanches decided to move out on loan to show the world the talents he displayed in Euro 2016. The recipient of the 2016 Golden Boy award moved to Swansea City on a season long, a deal fans were extremely excited about.
His arrival was supposed to herald in the new era under Paul Clement but it soon became apparent that he was not up to the levels expected in the Premier League. A luxury player who was often anonymous in games, Renato Sanches has looked disinterested during his time in England and he's failed to display anything that fans were waiting to see.
Swansea managed to win only one game out of the twelve that the Portuguese featured in. The 20-year-old managed 0 goals and 0 assists in those matches and the only thing fans remember from his stay at Wales is his attempted pass to the advertising hoarding.
Sanches' career has hit rock-bottom after a disastrous 2017-18 season which has also seen him miss out on the World Cup trip to Russia, just 2 years after being spotted in the Euros as the hottest talent to watch out for.
#3 Gylfi Sigurdsson (Everton) - £45 million
Sigurdsson’s success at Swansea and for Iceland made him one of the most desirable play-makers to sign at the start of the season and Everton pounced on the opportunity and signed him for £45 million. The major factor behind the Icelander's success at Swansea was that he was the focal point of the attack, but in Everton, he hasn't been afforded that freedom.
At Goodison Park, he is one of many central play-makers, including Wayne Rooney, and this saw him pushed out on the wing, a position where his strengths have been almost negated.
He has also suffered from by the absence of a line-leading centre-forward who would profit from his delivery, which meant that his vision and service went waste.
Having managed to strike double digits in assists or goals over the previous three campaigns with Swansea, Gylfi could only muster 4 goals and 3 assists this season, a dismal tally for a player of his talents. Sigurdsson looks the type of player who remains a star for a smaller club, but struggles at bigger clubs with better players around him.
#2 Tiemoue Bakayoko (Chelsea) - £40 million
Defending champions shockingly allowed Nemanja Matic to leave to title-rival Manchester United at the start of the season. Chelsea thought they had the position covered as Bakayoko was expected to fill the gap vacated by the Serbian midfielder. The French midfielder was signed for £40 million from French Ligue 1 winners AS Monaco, a campaign in which Bakayoko played a pivotal role.
However, he had a disastrous first season in Chelsea as he has been found out both defensively and offensively, so much so that fans are now unsure of what his best position is. The player who led the Monaco midfield has been nowhere to be seen, and a particularly dire performance against Watford earlier this season in which he got himself sent off in 30 minutes is his most regrettable performance.
Chelsea probably gave away all title hopes with their sale of Matic and the signing of Drinkwater and the aforementioned Bakayoko. Sadly, Bakayoko would surely be on the Worst Team of the season too.
#1 Davy Klassen (Everton) - £23.6 million
Davy Klassen was signed from Dutch side Ajax for £23.6 million after two extremely impressive seasons. Everton thought that they had landed one of the top talents from the Dutch Eredivisie, but like many other transfers from the Netherlands, Klassen is a transfer that has somehow failed to pay off.
Being the captain of Ajax and after being signed for such a high fee, it's extremely surprising that he just made 7 Premier League appearances, totalling just 250 minutes throughout the season. However, the fact was that he failed to impress in any of those matches he played in and neither contributed a goal or an assist despite playing in his favored position behind the striker.
Everton gained nothing from the cash they splurged on Klassen and his signing has been one of numerous other failed deals made by Everton in the previous summer.
