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Every summer, football fans around the world beg for their clubs to splash the cash in the transfer market. When the window closes in September, the rumour mill starts up again. There is never an end to the cycle of movement.
Transfer news alone has become a 24/7 news cycle (you can read our live blog here, by the way), yet it is often the moves on the lesser end of the sensationalist scale which often wind up being most successful.
There’s always a bargain to be had as long as you’re looking in the right places, and as it turns out, the contending clubs across the world can actually sign talented players at a snip if they focus their attentions enough.
GOAL has dug back through the relatively recent archives to pick out the 25 best-value deals since the turn of the millennium.
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Getty Images Sport25Seamus Coleman (Everton, £60,000)
For the sake of fairness (and ease), we will not be including free transfers in this list. At a snip £60,000, Seamus Coleman’s move from Sligo Rovers to Everton is as close to zero as we’re going to get.
The right-back will also be the least glamorous name making the least glamorous switch here. No offence, Seamus, that’s just how it is. But the Irishman does crack our top 25 because that is a ludicrously small price to pay for one of the Premier League’s better defenders and leaders for over a decade.
When all is said and done, Coleman will go down as probably the last true great of Goodison Park. He is everything to be admired about modern Everton.
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AFP24Mikel Arteta (Arsenal, £10m)
From an Everton incoming to a painful outgoing, Mikel Arteta’s exit from Merseyside led to some rather unique protests and backlash. If you had Twitter back in 2011 and were in Toffees circles, you’ll remember the age-old question of ‘where’s the Arteta money?’.
Arsenal forked out £10m to bring in the Spaniard, who was on the verge of turning 30 and brought some much-needed experience to a youthful midfield. Arteta would win a couple of FA Cups and inherit the captaincy, which may have been enough for him to sneak onto this list alone, but it’s his lasting legacy which clinched it for us.
Without this transfer, Arsenal would probably never have made the gamble to appoint Arteta as manager in 2019. The revolution he’s overseen may not have happened under just any old coach, and this particular butterfly effect is still being felt today. Isn’t it funny how life works, eh?
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Getty Images23Christian Eriksen (Tottenham Hotspur, £11.5m)
There were a few suggestions from Tottenham Hotspur backlogs which came into thinking for this 25. Luka Modric being plucked from Dinamo Zagreb out of obscurity prior to his Euro 2008 exploits was a superb piece of scouting, but he came at a then club-record £16.5m. Months earlier, Gareth Bale arrived from Southampton, but as a £10m left-back who’d played one season of senior football in the Championship.
The spirit of what this list is about and stands for therefore leads down the path of Christian Eriksen, who Spurs were somehow able to steal from Ajax for only £11.5m in 2013 when it was widely known he was a sure-thing to become one of the world’s leading playmakers.
In a stacked Tottenham side which featured Harry Kane, Dele Alli and Son Heung-min, Eriksen was often the player who raised everyone’s games and knitted everything together.
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AFP22Julio Cesar (Inter, £2m)
As a broad concept, the transfer market can be unforgiving, if at times downright stupid. The market for goalkeepers is an even greater exaggeration of that.
Realistically, you only need one outstanding candidate on your books, while the wild trajectory of goalies compared to other positions means it should be easier to find a favourable deal. And yet clubs seemingly find a way to make that look difficult.
Inter’s £2m purchase of Julio Cesar from Flamengo – via Chievo Verona to work around Serie A’s cap on non-EU players – goes down as one of the great goalkeeper transfers. At San Siro, he quickly established himself as a leading shot-stopper and helped the Nerazzurri to several trophies.
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AFP21Casemiro (Real Madrid, £5m)
Little did Real Madrid know when they initially loaned Casemiro to their Castilla side from Sao Paulo in 2012 that he would eventually make such a monumental impact for the senior team years later.
It may not have been in Los Blancos’ long-term thinking, but the Brazilian proved the perfect foil for their star-studded list of attacking midfielders and forwards. Without Casemiro carrying the water, Real would have had a much tougher time hoovering up all those Champions Leagues.
Don’t let his more recent tales of despair at Manchester United cloud your judgement of what was an all-time destroyer in his pomp.
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Getty Images Sport20Robin van Persie (Arsenal, £2.75m)
If you needed a tall-ish left winger turning into a complete centre forward, then Arsene Wenger was your man. He worked miracles with Thierry Henry in his early Arsenal days, and followed that up by transforming Robin van Persie.
It seems so obvious now that the Dutchman was a striker all along, but he also needed Wenger’s coaching, extended runs of games and breaks from injury in order to piece that all together.
By the time Van Persie forced through an ultimately Premier League-winning switch to Manchester United, he was crowned as an undoubted PFA Players’ Player of the Season and the runaway taker of the Golden Boot. All for under £3m.
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Getty Images Sport19Patrice Evra (Manchester United, £5.5m)
Before the days of his literal rose-tinted glass, iconic booming laugh and raw chicken-munching shenanigans, Patrice Evra was a fine left-back. By the time he rocked up at Manchester United in 2006, he had been capped several times by France and played in a Champions League final with Monaco.
With Arsenal, Liverpool and Real Madrid all said to be courting Evra, it’s a mystery how the Red Devils had to only fork out £5.5m to bring in one of the best defenders of his generation.
For eight years, Evra made life misery for right wingers, regularly locking them up and sending them back whence they came.
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AFP18Diego Godin (Atletico Madrid, £6.6m)
Were it not for Sergio Ramos, then Diego Godin would be remembered as the premier big-game centre-back of his generation. After all, he scored the goal which won Atletico Madrid the 2013-14 La Liga title – an equaliser away at Barcelona on the final day of the season – before grabbing the opening goal in their heartbreaking Champions League final defeat to rivals Real Madrid a week later.
Beyond those moments, the Uruguayan was one of the world’s most fierce and aggressive defenders, one you wouldn’t want to see coming your way in the rear-view mirror.
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Getty Images Sport17Ashley Cole (Chelsea, £5m plus William Gallas)
Ah, a good old-fashioned part-exchange deal. You don’t really get those anymore (unless a club is in PSR trouble and they’re scrambling for solutions).
Ashley Cole’s controversial switch from Arsenal to Chelsea in 2006 only set the Blues back a mere £5m and the addition of versatile defender William Gallas, whose place in the XI would have been forfeited to the left-back even if he didn’t want to swap west London for north.
That’s all it cost for arguably the best left-back of all time. It would be like offering a bag of crisps and an energy drink for a Rolex.
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Getty Images Sport16Cesar Azpilicueta (Chelsea, £7m)
Chelsea seem to have a penchant for sniffing out undervalued full-backs. Now, Cesar Azpilicueta wasn’t quite as talented as Cole, but he was just as important on the Blues’ road to glory.
Azpilicueta was an understated signing made shortly after Chelsea won the Champions League in 2012, initially brought in to provide competition at right-back. It’s ironic that he hardly played that position in over a decade at Stamford Bridge, making his name as an inverted left-back and a centre-back instead.
For 11 years, every manager who came through those west London doors found a use and a role for Azpilicueta. That doesn’t happen by accident.
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Getty Images Sport15Edwin van der Sar (Manchester United, £2m)
Edwin van der Sar was on the cusp of turning 35 when he was signed by Manchester United from Fulham, which is most likely why they were able to pinch him for a reported £2m. If the Cottagers knew he still had another six years left in the tank, they probably wouldn’t have been so generous in negotiations.
The gangly Dutchman fulfilled Sir Alex Ferguson’s premonition that he would be the Red Devils’ best stopper since the great Peter Schmeichel. United had fooled around and almost neglected the goalkeeper position in the 2000s until Van der Sar was drafted in.
As it turned out, Van der Sar peaked towards the very end of his career. He broke the world single-season record for longest run without conceding a goal (1,302 minutes) and saved Nicolas Anelka’s deciding penalty in the shootout of the 2008 Champions League final. Worth every penny.
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AFP14Nemanja Vidic (Manchester United, £7m)
Manchester United had a Christmas to remember in 2005, with Nemanja Vidic joining from Spartak Moscow for £7m in what was an unassuming piece of business, but a deal they had long hoped to conclude.
The Red Devils first identified the Serbian as a potential superstar two years earlier, but were unable to complete a move at first before they nearly missed out on him to Fiorentina. Sighs of relief were breathed around Old Trafford when he finally showed up, though even the most hopeful believers would have had trouble predicting just how immense he would become.
To this day, Vidic’s name is prominent, if not top of, lists for the Premier League’s best-ever defenders. This was a sensationally supreme piece of scouting by United that paid dividends.
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Getty Images Sport13Toni Kroos (Real Madrid, £25m)
This is another instance of the overall price dragging the player down the list rather than towards the upper echelons of it. Nonetheless, this was still a stupid piece of business.
It shouldn’t have mattered that Toni Kroos was on the fringes at Bayern Munich and on the chopping block. It shouldn’t have mattered that he had initially agreed to join David Moyes’ Manchester United. Real Madrid should simply not have been allowed to sign a player of Kroos’ calibre for only £25m, and Bayern should have been moving heaven and Earth to tie him down to the longest contract possible.
Remarkably, only 8,000 people turned up for Kroos’ unveiling at the Santiago Bernabeu. If Real fans knew he would go on to retire as Germany’s most decorated player, then it would have been packed out.
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AFP12Andy Robertson (£8m, Liverpool)
True fans of Football Manager wouldn’t have been too surprised at Andy Robertson’s ascent, but his story remains incredible regardless.
The left-back was an unassuming member of Hull City’s yo-yo squad between 2014 and 2017. He had a good cross and outstanding engine, though there were doubts over how these qualities would translate to an elite team like Liverpool.
As it turned out, he was the ideal player for the team Jurgen Klopp was building – a relentless leader who could pick out a man from wide areas and chip in with assists. In tandem with Trent Alexander-Arnold on the right, the Reds have boasted two of the world’s best full-backs for over half a decade now.
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Getty Images Sport11Vincent Kompany (Manchester City, £7m)
Truth be told, there aren’t too many good-value transfers in the 21st century which are lost to time. Vincent Kompany’s £7m move from Hamburg to Manchester City seems to be one of those, however.
A Premier League great and a Cityzens legend. A towering centre half who loved a header on derby day, a marauding defender whose piledriver all but won his club the 2018-19 Premier League title.
“Where do you want your statue, Vincent Kompany?” Gary Neville cried on commentary after that strike against Leicester City, and he was immortalised outside the Etihad Stadium soon after.
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AFP10Raphael Varane (Real Madrid, £9m)
At the top of this article, there was a lot of preamble about how even football’s elite need to find bargains in order to be successful. Well, get ready for a Real Madrid-themed stretch here which proves exactly that point.
Let’s start with Raphael Varane, whose rise through the Lens youth ranks and into the senior team as a teenager captured Real’s attentions at the start of the 2010s. Los Blancos pulled out all the stops to convince the defender they were the right team for him, including setting up a meeting with club legend and future coach Zinedine Zidane.
Varane chose Real, and as was the case at Lens, made an immediate impression at a young age. This was perhaps surmised best by then-manager Jose Mourinho, who did well to handle a loaded question about the dwindling game time of Pepe in 2013.
“Pepe’s problem has a name, and his name is Raphael Varane.” Simple as, really.
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Getty Images Sport9Marcelo (Real Madrid, £5.4m)
It isn’t really fair for one club to have had Roberto Carlos for such a long period of his career. It isn’t really fair they then brought in his regen soon after, either.
Real Madrid enjoyed Marcelo’s fruits of labour for 15 (fifteen) years, filling in up and down the left flank and proving an ideal partner for Cristiano Ronaldo, the high point of which was a Champions League quarter-final against Bayern Munich in 2017 which went down as one of the all-time great left-back displays.
Marcelo’s longevity is what edges him ahead of Varane, but we’re splitting hairs if we’re being honest.
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Getty Images Sport8Dani Carvajal (Real Madrid, £5.4m)
Real Madrid have a knack for sending their young players out on permanent transfers, but retaining cheap buy-back clauses to mug the selling club off a little.
Dani Carvajal went straight from the Castilla team to Bundesliga heavyweights Bayer Leverkusen in 2012, immediately tore up the German top flight, and then went back to the Spanish capital less than 12 months later.
That experience served Carvajal well and he has been Real’s go-to right-back ever since, playing over 400 games in the famous white and becoming club-captain.
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Getty Images Sport7Giorgio Chiellini (Juventus, £6.1m)
Who remembers the days of Italy’s co-ownership rules? These fiddly things meant that Juventus split the cost of buying Giorgio Chiellini in 2005 to two different clubs, with Livorno and Fiorentina the saps who gave up on him too quickly and too cheaply.
Juve didn’t know it at the time, but they had signed the defining Italian centre-back of the next decade, the country’s spiritual successor to the likes of Alessandro Nesta and Paolo Maldini.
Chiellini’s spell in Turin, which was just shy of two decades, was one of the most successful in Juventus’ entire history, the pure embodiment of their steely philosophy. For 18 years, he was Juventus.
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AFP6Kaka (AC Milan, £7.1m)
Silvio Berlusconi asserted AC Milan had signed Kaka for “peanuts” when they sent over £7.1m to Sao Paulo in exchange for the graceful midfielder. It’s an astonishing feat that even this turned out to be an understatement.
Kaka was so good that defenders tied themselves in knots and ran into each other in order to try and stop him. Kaka was so good that Manchester City wanted to make him the world’s first £100m player. Kaka was so good that the number 22 became iconic.
The Rossoneri were the Italian Galacticos in the 2000s, though Ballon d’Or-winner Kaka was the brightest star of the lot. And he only cost them a nine-figure sum.
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Getty Images Sport5Riyad Mahrez (Leicester City, £450,000)
The Leicester City fairytale has so many layers to it that it’s hard to keep up with all of them. In Riyad Mahrez’s case, he was never the focus of the Foxes’ attention at first, while he mistook the club for the Premiership rugby team across town.
Leicester initially wanted Le Havre team-mate Ryan Mendes, but came away wanting a different ‘RM’ winger instead. They certainly didn’t regret that scouting trip.
Mahrez was the PFA Player of the Season the year that Leicester won the Premier League. Now, the other two stars of that team are higher on this list (spoiler alert, sorry not sorry), but he was the one who impressed the most in that story.
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Getty Images Sport4N’Golo Kante (Leicester, £5.6m; Chelsea, £32m)
Signing for Leicester City is the main reason for N’Golo Kante’s inclusion here, but his successful stint at Chelsea afterwards takes him over the edge.
The midfielder’s sudden transformation into the world’s best ball-winner is proof that, despite losing that little bit of romanticism to stats and data, there are still hidden gems just waiting to be discovered.
You could juice a super-soldier full of Captain America-style serum and you would struggle to make a player as breathless as Kante.
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AFP3Samuel Eto’o (Inter, -£38.5m plus Zlatan Ibrahimovic)
Listen, Zlatan Ibrahimovic was a legendary player who was worth breaking the bank for, but Barcelona didn’t need to chuck Samuel Eto’o into a deal already pushing £40m like he was a set of used tyres.
The Cameroonian had just led the line for a Barca team that had won a historic treble. There should have been uproar in Catalonia that he was allowed to leave so freely yet forcefully. Their loss was the Nerazzurri’s gain.
Eto’o headed to Jose Mourinho’s Inter and partnered Diego Milito up front, forming a short-lived but legendary partnership at San Siro.
After Inter were crowned champions of Europe in May 2010, Eto’o completed a unique achievement which remains standalone to this day – he is the only player in history to win trebles in back-to-back seasons, but with two different clubs.
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Getty Images Sport2Jamie Vardy (Leicester City, £1.7m)
Until the age of 25, Jamie Vardy was plying his trade in non-league, downing Red Bulls and scoring goals for fun. After the age of 25, Vardy was plying his trade in the Championship and Premier League, downing Red Bulls and scoring goals for fun.
Leicester City’s reputation as supreme talent-spotters leading to their title win of 2016 was more than justified. The freakish relentlessness with which Vardy has always played irrespective of his fitness, age or mileage has turned him into a living legend. You’d have to look far and wide through the depths of human history to find a physical skillset as otherworldly as his.
Vardy is easily one of the most recognisable players and figures in English football. Yet he was still only playing for Fleetwood Town in the National League in his mid-twenties. That biographical film can’t come soon enough.
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Getty Images Sport1Cristiano Ronaldo (Manchester United, £12m)
The ship has probably sailed on Cristiano Ronaldo going down as the GOAT, but he is at least in most people’s top three for best players ever and, more importantly, tops our list of best-value 21st century signings. You can’t put a price on that, right?
Ronaldo first turned up at Manchester United with noodle-blond hair and in need of a dentist in 2003 after impressing against the Red Devils in a pre-season friendly, which itself is a wonderful transfer trope of a different generation of the market.
Even before heading to Real Madrid and shattering essentially every goal record in sight, the first dose of United-era Ronaldo was already one of football’s greatest ever players. That’s indisputable.
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