Last summer saw Manchester United obliterate the world transfer fee record by paying £89m to bring Paul Pogba home from Juventus. The monstrous fee surpassed the £85m paid by Real Madrid to Tottenham in 2013 for Gareth Bale – that is if you believe Bale’s fee and not Cristiano Ronaldo’s – also paid by Real Madrid, in 2009 – was the record-holder. However you look at it, it’s an insane amount of money.
This season has already seen wild rumours flying around about the world’s biggest clubs making world-record bids for some of the football world’s fastest rising stars, but could we see Pogba’s record fee eclipsed so soon? Personally, I don’t think so and here are five reasons why.
#1 No club needs to make a statement this year
Since Sir Alex Ferguson left Old Trafford in 2013, Manchester United have hardly set the Premier League on fire, let alone Europe’s top competitions. Finishing in seventh place in 2013/14 left them out of the Champions League picture and despite returning to the top four in 2014/15, last season saw them slip downwards once again.
They remain arguably the world’s richest club, however, and part of the reason they paid so much money for Pogba, in my opinion, was to make a statement, that despite a downturn in their fortunes on the pitch, off the pitch they wield as much power as they ever have done. What better way to prove that than to break the world transfer fee record?
Sure, Pogba is a great player, but realistically he hadn’t done quite as much as the likes of Bale, Ronaldo, and in the past Zinedine Zidane to really warrant such a fee. Juventus knew United would pay whatever it took to bring Pogba to Old Trafford and so they simply took advantage.
This year though, none of the biggest clubs in the world have slipped quite like United and so none of them really need to make the kind of statement that breaking the record sends. After all, if you’re successful on the pitch, you don’t really need to flex your financial muscles too much.
#2 There’s no ‘Galactico’ for Real Madrid to sign
If there’s any team more financially powerful than Manchester United, it’s Real Madrid. The Spanish giants have broken the world transfer fee record five times since the turn of the millennium, usually in order to bring the world’s best players to the Bernabeu as part of their notorious ‘Galactico’ project. Could they do it this year? If they so wished, but the problem is that well, there’s no real ‘Galactico’ out there who’s available right now.
Think about it. The players who went to Real to break the record were Luis Figo, Zinedine Zidane, Kaka, Cristiano Ronaldo and Gareth Bale. All of them were talked about as perhaps the best player on the planet at the time of their transfer. Madrid’s big targets this year include Kylian Mbappe, Eden Hazard and David de Gea. Great players, but none of them really scream ‘Galactico’ like those record-breaking names. They’re more in line with big Madrid signings like David Beckham, Michael Owen, Toni Kroos and James Rodriguez.
If Neymar or Luis Suarez – or dare I say it, Lionel Messi – became available, then perhaps Real would break the record in order to bring another Galactico aboard. But while there are no Galacticos available then Madrid are unlikely to break the record. And if Real won’t do it then who the hell will?
#3 Clubs may be wary post-Pogba
While I don’t think it’s fair to judge a player simply on one season – especially as he’s only 24 years old. However, it’s fair to say at this stage that Paul Pogba hasn’t set the world alight since his mega-money move to Old Trafford. When you spend £89m on a player you kind of expect them to hit the ground running, and Pogba just hasn’t done that despite a handful of outstanding performances.
If anything, he’s been outshone at Old Trafford by a free transfer (Zlatan Ibrahimovic) and at times by an academy graduate (Marcus Rashford). The final judgment on whether Pogba was truly worth all that money will likely come a few years down the line, but it’s worth wondering whether his low-key performances this year have partially been caused by the added spotlight that comes with being the world’s most expensive player.
With football now more than ever being seen as a big business venture, the last thing clubs want to do – even mega-rich ones like United – is waste money. If Pogba had been a huge hit instantly then his success could’ve inspired other huge clubs to take the risk and splash out, even more, money for a prospect like Kylian Mbappe or Dele Alli. As it is though, they might be a little more careful with their purse-strings after seeing Pogba not really live up to his fee.
#4 Players may be wary post-Pogba
On the other side of the coin to the previous point, how do the players feel about such huge transfer fees? With no real established star – like a Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi or Neymar – likely to move this season, the spotlight is shining heavily on highly-rated prospects like Kylian Mbappe, Antoine Griezmann and Dele Alli to make potential moves.
After seeing Pogba struggle this season though, who’s to say that a player like Alli or Mbappe would want to move to one of Europe’s giants right now, especially if their transfer fee was to break the world record? While they seem full of confidence at their somewhat smaller clubs, making a record-breaking move to Madrid or Manchester could cause their fee to become a millstone around their necks.
It wouldn’t surprise me, for all of the speculation surrounding his future, if Mbappe, for instance, chose to spend at least another two or three seasons at Monaco to truly establish himself before moving onto bigger things. It’d certainly make sense – Ronaldo didn’t leave United for Real until he was in his prime – almost 25 years old – while Zidane made the move to the Bernabeu widely recognised as the world’s best player.
For a youngster like Alli or Mbappe, why rush these things?
#5 The top players on the market aren’t at huge clubs
Part of the reason that Juventus were able to command such a monstrous fee last season for Pogba was that they’re probably the biggest and most powerful club in Italy. Realistically – unless Pogba were to have totally dug his heels in and refused to play, ala Dimitri Payet – they didn’t have to sell him to United. The same could, of course, have been said when United themselves sold Ronaldo to Real Madrid back in 2009.
This season’s potential big movers though – the likes of Mbappe and Griezmann – don’t currently play for all-powerful European giants. While Monaco look set to lift the league title in France, Ligue 1 just doesn’t have the same clout as the Premier League or La Liga, which means players who ply their trade there are always likely to move elsewhere eventually. And while Atletico Madrid are hugely successful in La Liga, in terms of finances they fall way behind Spain’s two giants (Real and Barcelona) and the Premier League’s sharks like Manchester City and Chelsea.
This means that to tempt one of those players away, a buying club like Real or Man United may not have to push as hard as they did for Pogba or Ronaldo. Maybe a fee much less than £89m would be enough to tempt Monaco or Atletico into selling someone like Mbappe or Griezmann, which makes it even less likely that Pogba’s record will go.
