Here are the 10 players bought and sold for the biggest profit. Includes only players for whom a fee was paid before being sold on. No freebies…
10) Antony – £67m
Ajax paid an initial fee that was the equivalent of £13m for Antony when they bought him from Sao Paulo in 2020 and in 2022 finally agreed a deal with the dithering Manchester United that started at a guaranteed £80m, though another £13m was due to be sent to the Brazilian club.
The jury is very definitely out on whether Antony was worth even close to £80m, with his performances in a United shirt verging from the sublime to the ridiculous and back again, via one of those silly little spins.
9) Cristiano Ronaldo – £67.76million
Few had heard of then 17-year-old when he joined United for £12.24million – half their windfall from selling David Beckham – in 2003 but six years at United turned Ronaldo into arguably the world’s best player.
Given Ronaldo’s desire to join Real, which he had made crystal clear 12 months previously, the deal came as no surprise when it was announced. More surprising was how reluctant United were to reinvest the £80million. Sir Alex Ferguson’s four signings the summer he sold Ronaldo: Antonio Valencia, Gabriel Obertan, Michael Owen and Mame Biram Diouf.
They haven’t really made a profit on a player since.
8) Harry Maguire – £68million
To turn a £12million defender into an £80million world-record-breaking centre-half in two years was quite the trick for Leicester. And it’s one they have done incredibly well with N’Golo Kante, Ben Chilwell, Danny Drinkwater, Riyad Mahrez and others.
Manchester United were initially happy with their deal but here we are in 2023 and they would probably take £30m for Maguire after he became fourth or possibly even fifth-choice centre-half.
7) Gareth Bale – £75million
The Wales star turned himself from a player on the verge of a loan move to the Championship into the world’s most expensive player ever in 2013 when Real Madrid agreed to pay Spurs £85million.
But that status offered little protection at the Bernabeu, where Bale was relentlessly targeted by the fans until he finally left the club with a whole horde of medals.
6) Antoine Griezmann – £83.6million
Atletico Madrid insisted that they deserved more than the £107million they were paid by Barca as the Catalan giants met his buy-out clause. That still represented a whopping profit, which was barely dinted when Barcelona sold him…
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