Players whose business is selling.
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| Players whose business is selling. |
Believe it or not, at the end of the day football is a business. And business is a money-making factory. Some European clubs are experts in selling these players in the transfer market.
Their business strategy is to buy players for a small amount of money, develop them after two or three years and sell them at several times the price. Every year there is a sale, every year there is a search for emerging, talented players from different parts of the world. Year after year, new faces come to the club, old faces go. Thus the wheel turns, the business grows, the treasury swells.
Let's take Neymar. Barcelona bought him from Santos for €88m in 2013, rising to €222m when he moved to PSG four years later. A dividend also went to this second round of sales to Santos, the club that raised Pele-Pushe.
However, not all players are traded for such a large amount. Profits are mainly made by selling underweight footballers. Most of the clubs that do best in this player sales business are outside of Europe's top five leagues.
This list of clubs that have done the best business by selling players over the past era comes courtesy of Transfer Market.
Benfica
Highest buy: Darwin Nunez (from Almeria for €34 million)
Highest sold: Darwin Nunez (to Liverpool for €75m)
Benfica has won a record 37 titles in the 21st century. But perhaps the Portuguese club's biggest success has been in player sales. This one club alone has earned more than a billion euros from the sale of footballers in the last two decades.
Benfica acquires players in two ways. One is from the club's academy. The academy has several of Europe's top youth coaches, who play a major role in developing the youngsters. They sold Joao Felix to Atletico Madrid for 126 million and Ruben Diaz to Man City for 68 million.
Aside from that, Benfica has a strong network for scouting promising and talented players from all over the world.Through which they brought footballers like Angel Di Maria and Pablo Aimar from Argentina, David Luiz from Brazil for a very low fee.
The question now is whether there are many more clubs in other European countries, particularly in the top five league countries. Why do more South Americans visit the Portuguese club than the Spanish club? Basically, Portugal's climate, culture, and football style have some advantages. South Americans do not need to worry about crossing the Atlantic to Portugal.
The language of Brazil is Portuguese.It is also simple to find work as a foreigner in Portugal. That's why Benfica brought the young people of Brazil-Argentina to the team for less money with the advantage of being able to play.These young people also believe that Portugal is a stopover for their careers.
Benfica is also known for producing talented footballers from smaller European countries such as Serbia, Slovenia, and Sweden. For example, they paid NK Olympia four million euros for Slovenian goalkeeper Jan Oblak, then sold him to Atletico for 16 million.
Academy sold Victor Lindelof to Manchester United for €35 million. And the latest profit was 41 million euros from the sale of Nunez, who was bought from Almeria just two years ago.
porto
Top buys: David Carmo-Braga, Olivier Torres-Atletico, Giannelli Imbula-Marseille (20m)
Highest sale: Militao (to Real Madrid for €50m)
Porto have won 12 titles since the 2000-01 season, regularly playing in the Champions League. But the Portuguese club also has great success in the player trading business. So far they have not bought any player for more than 20 million, but have sold for 50 million euros.
They also have examples of success in selling players to new markets. Porto's big business in the last two decades began with the €50m sale of Ricardo Carvalho and Paulo Ferreira to Chelsea in 2004.
Like Benfica, Porto has a strong network in South America for finding talented footballers. For example, they bought Radamel Falcao for five and a half million euros from River Plate, then sold him to Atletico for a profit of 34 and a half million euros.
There is also Militao, who was brought from Sao Paulo for 7 million (sold to Real for 43 million after one year), Luis Diaz, who was brought from Junior FC for 7 million (sold to Liverpool for 40 million after two years). Porto also has a good sales record in new markets.
In 2010, Hulk and Bruno Alvez were sold to St. Petersburg, Russia, for 62 million euros, a huge sum at the time.
Vitinia (PSG), who built their own academy, sold Fabio Vieira (Arsenal) and Fabio Silva (Wolves) for 116 million euros.
ajax
Highest buy: Steven Bergwein, (from Tottenham for €31.3 million)
Highest sale: Anthony (95 million to Manchester United)
Ajax's academy has long been known as the most prestigious academy in European football. Compared to Portuguese clubs, Ajax's player supply rate has decreased, but it is still not very low. Sold five players for €207 million this season (Lisandro Martinez and Anthony to Manchester United, Sebastian Aller to Dortmund, Ryan Gravenbarch to Bayern and Nicolas Tagliafico to Lyon).
Apart from this, among the academy players of this club, Frankie de Jong (86 million in Barcelona), Matthias de Licht (85 million in Juventus), Donny von de Beek (39 million in United) have been bought for a good price. There is a record of doing good business even by bringing someone from another club.
Uruguayan star Luis Suarez was bought from Groningen for 7.5 million dollars and sold to Liverpool for 15 million profit after four years. Hakim Ziyech was brought from KFC Twente for 11 million, then sold to Chelsea for 44 million.
lil
Highest buy: Jonathan David (from Gent for €27 million)
Highest sold: Nicolas Pepe (to Arsenal for €80 million)
This club of the French league can be said to be the supplier of Premier League footballers. Among the clubs that sold players, the club that won the league in the 2020-21 season probably gave the most players to the English league in the last decade. For example, Yohan Cabaye and Mathew Dibushy near Newcastle, Idrissa Gaye and Anwar El Ghazi near Aston Villa.
Nicolas Pepe is Lille's most expensive player to date in monetary terms. But in terms of profit, the big business has been mainly with Nigerian striker Victor Osimene. Lille sold the Nigerian to Napoli for 75 million euros, bought from Charlois for 22.4 million euros.
Both transfers are in 2019. However, even if they get the whole money for Oshimen at once, they will get the Pep money in five-year installments. After winning the league title a season ago, the transfer of players abroad has gained momentum. The club has already put 100 million euros into the account this summer.
That came from the sale of Sven Botman to Newcastle (for 37 million), Amadou Onana to Everton (for 36 million), Renato Sanchez to PSG (for 15 million) and Zeke Celik to Roma (for 7 million). Along with the footballers, coach Christophe Gaultier and sporting director Luis Campos, the main coach of the successful season, have also transferred to PSG.
Salzburg
Highest buy: Lucas Gurna-Duath, (from Saint-Etienne for €13 million)
Highest sale: Brendan Aaronson, (to Leeds for €32.9 million)
Physically strong, attacking style of play, good speed, big breath—Salzburg selects budding footballers based on specific criteria. The proof of this Austrian club is Aaronson (32.9 million to Leeds), Arling Holland (20 million to Dortmund), Karim Adeyemi (30 million to Dortmund), Patson Daka (30 million to Leicester City), Sadio Mane (23 to Southampton million) and sold Enoch Mepuke (to Brighton for 23 million).
Not only to outside clubs, but Salzburg also supply players to Red Bull affiliate Leipzig. In this case, however, since the main organization is the same, the amount of profit is not so much. Since 2010, more than 20 Salzburg players have been transferred to Leipzig. Among them are Naby Keita (30 million), Dominic Soboslai (22 million), Amadou Haidara (19 million), Dayat Upamecano (18.5 million), Benjamin Sisco (24 million).
