Everton sign a 15 year old for £2 millon

[Lady Whistledown]

History is littered with lads who were signed at a young age amid much fanfare, & disappeared into the ether.

Tom Taiwo & Michael Woods were nicked by Chelsea off Leeds if I remember correctly. Woods has done chuff all and Taiwo was at Carlisle last time I looked. Pennant has never become the player he was touted as when he was at Notts County, even if he has had a reasonable PL career. See also Freddy Adu. Cherno Samba. Nii Lamptey.

 

[The Terminator]

football is mad now , only a few years ago a 25mil signing was a huge signing , now its pocket money .
2million for a 15year old with potential , ridiculous .

 

[BigGully]

Obviously not an initial £2m payment, but maybe with add ons if he does fulfil his potential.

Some compensation would have to be paid initially, but if he goes on and become a Premiership player then Everton would be happy to pay the add ons, by becoming a Premiership player they would have themselves a £5m+ asset and if he fails then they only lose their initial outlay.

You must also remember that the bigger clubs have a stable of players that might not succeed at Premiership level but can then move those players on at reasonable prices of anything up to £1m, to other leagues.

 

[Cloughie]

You can't blame Everton for taking a gamble on potential - Arsenal are proof that it can be successful to an extent. What's to say that this lad won't get 5/6 games for the 1st XI by the end of the season, impress and they see his value double? As edna points out, it is often flawed as there are plenty of examples where potential amounts to very little but in terms of the premier league - what is 350K - 2m?

I know a lad called Craig Garside who was at Everton in the same age group as Rooney. When Sam Hammam was at Cardiff he offered £5m for the pair of them (Rooney and Garside) after they had impressed for their respective countries at U-16 level in the victory shield. Craig is now overweight and plays the equivalent of Brighton league standard football. If Everton had the chance to sell him now with this retrospective knowledge which they obtain, he'd have been gone in a heartbeat.

 

[BensGrandad]

David Goodwillie
Simon Vukcevic
John Arne Riise
James Vaughan
DJ Campbell
Ahmed Elmohamady
Ji Dong-won
Wes Brown
Michel Vorm
Leroy Lita
Shaun Maloney


and thats without the free transfers?

How man of those would have helped or improved Everton very few if indeed any.