While inflation in the Netherlands is slowly but surely falling to ‘normal’ levels, football players seem to be getting more expensive every day. Clubs worldwide spent more than 7.6 billion euros this summer on new players, calculated trade website Transfermarkt. A record, and then the last two days of the ‘transfer window’ – traditionally the busiest – still had to get going.
The influence of Saudi capital flooding the market is being felt, on top of the buying drive of European top clubs, especially from the English Premier League, and often in the hands of wealthy investors or oil states.
And the Dutch top? It benefits in the form of high transfer proceeds. Ajax, Feyenoord and PSV together set record expenditures this summer, encouraged by the prospect of two guaranteed Champions League tickets per next season, a tournament that will also become even more lucrative due to a changed set-up. How were the millions spent? According to what strategy?
Confidence at PSV
The timing of the festivities could have been better for the PSV management. Thursday afternoon a large staff party in honor of the 110th anniversary, Friday evening a gala for relations at the former Philips estate De Wielewaal, just outside Eindhoven. While the champagne was circulating there, the last hours of the transfer window ticked away, the most hectic period of the year for the management.
The transfer summer also reached a climax for PSV directors Marcel Brands (managing director), Earnest Stewart (technical director) and Jaap van Baar (financial director) just before the market closed. For an estimated 15 million, PSV brought Napoli striker and old acquaintance Hirving Lozano to Eindhoven on Friday – he was presented during the gala. In the last hours before the deadline, PSV also hired defender Armel Bella-Kotchap from Southampton. At the same time, the club sold midfielder Ibrahim Sangaré to Nottingham Forest for around 35 million. Brentford is also said to have offered 40 million for Johan Bakayoko. The winger thanked for a switch to the Premier League club.
Read also: PSV is back after five years among the European eliteafter Rangers were defeated by a wide margin
The transfer policy shows the self-confidence of the club that was forced to sell stars Cody Gakpo and Noni Madueke last winter to get its finances in order. PSV had put together an expensive selection under former trainer Roger Schmidt, which had always just failed to qualify for the Champions League. As a result, the club had ended up in a situation where it started the season with a deficit of 40 million euros. Due to the restructuring round halfway through the season, the chances of winning the championship were all but lost. But, Brands promised, there was room to invest in the summer.
He kept his word. Judging by Transfermarkt figures, PSV spent a record €50 million on new players in recent months. There was a similar amount of transfer proceeds. Researcher Job Gulikers (Hogeschool van Arnhem en Nijmegen), who critically follows the financial policy of football clubs, previously wrote on social media that PSV is “falling into old habits”. In other words: the club takes (too) large financial risks in the hunt for sporting success.
The club management sees it differently. PSV has cleared its financial reserves through the winter transfers, while with the departure of Timo Baumgartl and Philipp Max, among others, players have left who had a relatively large amount of money on their balance sheet. The chance that PSV will be able to sell experienced newcomers Sergino Dest, Jerdy Schouten and Hirving Lozano later for a lot of money is not great, but on the other hand they immediately improve the team. The latter also applies to attacker Noa Lang, the replacement for the departed taste maker Xavi Simons. Moreover, the PSV management estimates, with Bakayoko, Ismael Saibari and Isaac Babadi, the club has enough talents that can generate tens of millions in the future.
The choice to invest in relatively arrived players – a big contrast with Ajax – is working out well for the time being, with placement for the Champions League. “We don’t want to narrow the gap with Ajax, we want to bridge it,” said then technical director John de Jong more than a year ago, shortly before he lost the confidence of the PSV commissioners. His successor Stewart seems to be well on his way to realizing that ambition.
Is Mislintat right?
He holds his right hand loosely in his pocket, a black crossbody bag slung over his right shoulder, and presses a phone to his left ear. After being spotted at Schiphol for a flight to Zagreb a few weeks earlier, Sven Mislintat was actually spotted in the Croatian capital at the beginning of August. Venue: Maksimir Stadium, home of Dinamo Zagreb.
It is the image of Ajax’s turbulent transfer summer. Mislintat traveled across Europe in search of reinforcements. In Zagreb he was for defender Josip Sutalo (23), which became the most expensive summer purchase: 20.5 million euros, which can still rise to 23.5 million due to variables.
Twelve players brought Mislintat this summer, for a total of more than 100 million euros, against about 160 million in sales. Late on Friday evening it turned out that the Croatian Borna Sosa from VfB Stuttgart is still coming – the selection will then have four left backs. What is striking is that Mislintat explicitly focuses on promising players around the age of twenty, guys who are unknown to the general public. And they come from all over the world: among the ten nationalities there is only one Dutchman – midfielder Branco van den Boomen.
Read also: who is Sven Mislintat, the new technical director of Ajax? A profile from just after his appointment in April.
Mislintat, a former scout who made a name for himself discovering hidden talents, went on to surprise the rank and file in second-tier leagues. There he brought in three players, two of which for substantial amounts: attacker Chuba Akpom from Middlesbrough cost 12.3 million, Georges Mikautadze from FC Metz (last season Ligue 2) 16 million. Winger Forbs, bought from Manchester City for 14 million, has no experience in professional football.
According to Mislintat, it doesn’t really matter which league a player plays in, you can value talents at all kinds of levels, he said Thursday. “It’s about the real quality,” he added Ziggo Sport. According to him, you “have to be brave” to make those kinds of choices.
Now that the selection is complete, the question is getting louder whether the material is good enough. The first whistle sounded on Thursday evening, after a bad performance in the preliminary round of the Europa League against Ludogorets (0-1 loss, after a 4-1 win in Bulgaria). “I am happy with all the new players, but it remains to be seen whether they have the qualities we ascribe to them,” said coach Maurice Steijn afterwards.
Internally there are also doubts. On the one hand, there is admiration that Mislintat steers his own course, relying largely on his network. But his working method is also experienced as a soloist. Steijn hinted this week that he had little influence on the choices Mislintat made. It is also pointed out internally that a lot has been paid for broadening reinforcements, but that too few players have been recruited with direct added value.
Expensive couch at Feyenoord
On a Wednesday afternoon at the end of August, Luka Ivanusec, the most talked about player in Rotterdam this transfer summer, finally walks into De Kuip in a Feyenoord shirt. ‘Dobrodošao Luka’, is written in Croatian on a screen behind the chair in which he sits – ‘Welcome Luka’. The attacker was taken over from Dinamo Zagreb for about 8.5 million euros after months of negotiations.
The Croatian international (24) is the most important summer signing. Since their first contact more than six weeks ago, coach Arne Slot called him several times and regularly sent messages. Specifically to emphasize that he hoped he would come soon. “That’s when I knew he really wanted me here,” says Ivanusec. Dinamo kept him in Zagreb for European qualifiers as long as possible.
The fact that Feyenoord managed to sign him confirms the new status of the defending champion. Until two years ago, Feyenoord could not pay these amounts, let alone the correspondingly high salaries. About 9 million has been paid for the Japanese Ayase Ueda, a record, while he is probably reserve striker this season. The fact that Feyenoord can move into a higher segment is due to the sporting success and the resulting considerably higher transfer income. A trend break with the years before in which the club sold players for little.
Read also: a report about the preparation for the Feyenoord season. This is how Arne Slot prepared his team
Feyenoord is now stronger in width than in recent years. When Slot started in 2021, the club still had to “cut back” on salary budget compared to the previous season under Dick Advocaat. Last year the salary budget was 23 million euros, this season it is expected to be several million euros higher.
The couch is better now. And more expensive. On Sunday against Almere City, purchases of Ramiz Zerrouki (more than 7 million), Ueda (9 million) and Thomas Beelen (3 million) started as reserves. Slot does not rule out that intended key player Calvin Stengs, bought for 6 million, can also happen.
In terms of investments, Feyenoord is still losing out to PSV and Ajax, who bought several players between 10 and 20 million euros. That difference is one reason why Feyenoord failed to get reinforcements that have a direct impact – except for Ivanusec, from whom the technical management expects a lot. Feyenoord has been quantitatively or strengthened compared to last season, the question is whether the starting eleven is qualitatively better.
This article has been updated after the transfer deadline has closed, in the night from Friday to Saturday at 00:00.
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper on September 2, 2023.