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| [photo by Ronnie Macdonald] |
- by Adam Huntington, writing from Dundee, Scotland
Money within football, always pretty ridiculous, has reached sickening new heights. Due to my dislike of how the English media inflate their own players talent, and how all Premier League clubs have a seemingly bottomless money pit to dip into, I'll be focussing solely on deals inside the English League. Earlier this month, Jordan Henderson and Phil Jones completed dreams moves to Liverpool and Manchester United respectively. Two young English players making it to two of the biggest club teams in the world, which is great. The money paid however, was so ludicrous it verged on pathetic. Henderson cost Liverpool £20 million, a bright talent he may be, but he's no where near proven enough to justify that amount of money, having played something like seventy games in his entire career. Jones, a good centre back, cost United a reported £17 million despite only playing for Blackburn thirty five times in total. Talented though they may be, these players are nothing more than expensive gambles. There's no guarantee at all that Jones and Henderson will develop into world-beating players.
The hype that young English players get from the press is nothing short of astounding. When we look at the last four relatively high-profile and high-costing transfers regarding young English players, we see Henderson, Jones, Carroll and Smalling. Combined, the total price these players cost is £80 million. How many England first-team caps do they have between them? Three. Completely unproven internationally, but somehow they've found themselves with a huge price tag around their neck. Compare this to a selection of Scottish players transfers; Mark Reynolds, James McArthur, Kenny Miller, Charlie Adam and Gary Caldwell. With the exception of Miller, all moved from Scottish clubs to English ones, however they cost peanuts in comparison. These five players cost an approximate total of £2 million. However between them, they have one hundred and ten Scotland first-team caps. Admittedly Scotland's national team isn't as good as Englands, but these Scottish players feature regularly for their new teams; Caldwell and McArthur usually start for Wigan and Charlie Adam has had superlatives thrown at him all season. However, when reports came out in January about Adam leaving to go to Liverpool, the price was rumoured to be about £9 million. This is where the price to talent ratio comes heavily into question. Charlie Adam was undisputedly better than Jordan Henderson, this season, so why would his value less than half of the young Englishman's?
Watching England take on Ukraine in the Under 21 European Championships through the week, in which they struggled to a boring 0-0 draw, I was seriously unimpressed with the players on show. Mancienne looked very uncomfortable, Sturridge seemed hell bent on scoring from 30+ yards, and Welbeck choked when he had a golden chance. Jones played pretty well, had a huge lapse in concentration that could have resulted in a goal, and got needlessly booked, but was never really troubled. Henderson didn't really do anything to justify any part of his transfer fee; he did nothing wrong, but nothing right either. Compare this to Spain's Juan Mata, who has easily been the tournament's best player so far. His excellent vision, passing and technique gave him two assists in their 2-0 win over the Czechs. Or the Spanish captain Javi Martinez, who looks like he's going to be an incredible defensive midfielder, already comfortable in breaking up the opposition's attack. How much would they be worth if they were English? I wonder.
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| [photo by "vagueonthehow"] |
- by Eddie Smith, writing from Glasgow, Scotland
Henderson was born on 17th June 1990 and is a midfielder who was born in Sunderland. He played his youth career at Sunderland between 2006-2008 and made his debut for the senior team in 2008. He went on a loan spell at Coventry City for a season and came back to the Stadium of Light. Before his move to Liverpool, he played 71 games for Sunderland and scored 4 goals and also made his full England international debut last year.
Earlier this year in January, Jordan Henderson was placed on the official FIFA website as one of the top players to watch in 2011 and he was extremely highly rated by Sunderland manager, Steve Bruce. This evidence points to the fact that Henderson might very well have a bright future at Liverpool and it gives further emphasis on the fact that there is a change in philosophy at the club.
Could it be the case that Liverpool are going to build a squad that has mainly home-based players in it? It certainly seems so when you look at the players the club have been linked with this summer. Charlie Adam, Ashley Young, Joey Barton, Lee Cattermole and Stewart Downing have been linked with the club and whether these rumours are true or not, it does suggest that their transfer policy has changed considerably. It might also be the case that fans buying Liverpool shirt printing are mostly wanting home-based players on the back of their jerseys.
If Henderson lives up to potential, he could be a long-term midfielder for the club and might be the one to drive them onto winning trophies again. When you combine this potential with the fact that the club have already signed players like Luis Suarez and Andy Carroll, it could be an exciting time to be a Liverpool fan again. Only time will tell, but you could see a completely different side in a couple of seasons and possibly one that is lifting silverware in the near future.
Written by Eddie Smith, a sports writer who also likes to blog about new replica football shirts.