9/12/2007 13:08
The Premier League's Most Expensive Benchwarmers
How much talent is unused on the bench of Premier League clubs each week, and how much is it potentially worth on the transfer market?
The Premier League's Most Expensive Benchwarmers
The Daily Mail newspaper this week looked at the added values of players named as substitutes for their teams for last week-end’s (Matchday 15) English Premier League matches.
The question, in essence, was: “How expensive was your team’s bench last weekend”?
The answer, according to the Mail, was that, “Players who cost their clubs a total of £300.5m (€416m) in fees —including 58 internationals— were on the bench in last weekend’s 10 top-flight games."
Moreover, those figures did not take into account Bosman free transfers or the value of players developed by a club’s youth system.
The Mail highlighted Sunderland’s Craig Gordon, the most expensive goalkeeper in Britain at a cost of £9million (€12.4m) from Hearts in the summer, who was on the bench for the victory over Derby.
And the combined cost of Chelsea’s bench for the visit of West Ham was a cool £67.6m (€93.6m), made up of Andriy Shevchenko (£30m), Shaun Wright-Phillips (£21m), and Claude Makelele (16.6m). Hilario and Ben Haim were bought on free transfers.
Second came Liverpool, whose bench totalled £37.5m (€52m) in value, including Javier Mascherano and Ryan Babel.
Manchester United's subs came in at £34m, or €48m, including Michael Carrick and Louis Saha.
Reading were the only club with no international player among their subsititutes. And Bolton were the only club naming five substitutes of whom none cost a transfer fee.
The Mail compared this situation with that in the inaugural season of the Premier League (1992-93), when only three subs were permitted, and the subs at most clubs were a combination of emerging youngsters, fringe players and the odd big-money signing coming back from injury.
Now, in the era of large, "in-depth" squads whose members are routinely rotated, it is not unusual to find such superstars as former European Footballers of the year or World Cup winners - or players whose transfer fees broke records - waiting for a cameo appearance from the bench.
The full ranking from the Daily Mail's report is as follows:
1 CHELSEA £67.6m
(Shevchenko — £30m; Wright-Phillips — £21m; Makelele — £16.6m; Hilario — free; Ben Haim — Bosman free)
2 LIVERPOOL £37.5m
(Mascherano — £17m; Babel — £11.5m; Kuyt — £9m; Hobbs — nominal fee; Itandje — free)
3 MANCHESTER UNITED £34.8m
(Carrick — £18.6m; Saha — £12.2m; Kuzsczak — £4m; Fletcher — youth team; O’Shea — youth team)
4 ARSENAL £19.0m
(Walcott — £12m; Gilberto — £4.5m; Senderos — £2.5m; Lehmann — free; Bendtner — youth team)
5 TOTTENHAM £16.6m
(Defoe — £7m; Boateng — £5.8m; Huddlestone — £2.5m; Lee — £1.3m; Cerny — free)
6 SUNDERLAND £16.0m
(Gordon — £9m; Chopra — £5m; Stokes — £2m; Miller — free; Harte — free)
7 ASTON VILLA £13.0m
(Davies — £8m; Harewood — £4m; Maloney — £1m; Berger — free; Taylor — free)
8 EVERTON £12.6m
(Johnson — £8.6m; Jagielka — £4m; Wessels — free; Hibbert — youth team; Anichebe — youth team)
9 NEWCASTLE £12.3m
(Enrique — £6.5m; Emre — £3.8m; Carr — £2m; Harper — nominal fee; Viduka — Bosman free)
10 WEST HAM £11.75m
(Ashton — £7.25m; Ljungberg — £3m; Collins £1m; Spector £0.5m; Wright — free)
11 MANCHESTER CITY £11.4m
(Bianchi — £8.8m; Jihai — £2m; Hart — £0.6m; Etuhu — youth team; Ball — free)
12 BLACKBURN £10.0m
(Savage — £3m; Roberts — £3m; Reid — £2.5m; Pedersen — £1.5m; Brown — Bosman free)
13 BIRMINGHAM £8.6m
(Kapo — £3m; Forssell — £3m; O’Connor — £2.6m; Parnaby — Bosman free; Doyle — youth team)
14 PORTSMOUTH £6.4m
(Nugent — £6m; Taylor — £0.4m; Kanu — free; Ashdown — nominal fee; Hreidarsson — free)
15 MIDDLESBROUGH £6.0m
(Huth — £6m; Cattermole — youth team; Tuncay — Bosman free; Steele — youth team; Hutchinson — youth team)
16 DERBY COUNTY £5.6m
(Earnshaw — £3.5m; Mears — £1m; Fagan — £0.75m; Leacock — £0.375m; Price — nominal fee)
17 FULHAM £5.5m
(Baird — £3m; Healy — £1.5m; Warner — nominal fee; Bocanegra — free; Seol — £1m)
18 WIGAN £3.7m
(Cotterill — £2m; Taylor — £0.75m; Pollitt — £0.2m; Granqvist — £0.75; Skoko — free)
19 READING £2.1m
(Cissé — £0.6m; Long — £0.5; Bikey — nominal fee; Federici — youth team; Rosenior — £1m)
20 BOLTON £0.0m
(Stelios; Al Habsi; Wilhelmsson; Teymourian; Alonso — all Bosman free transfers)
Mark Hinton, Goal.com
http://www.goal.com/en/Articolo.aspx?ContenutoId=508250
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