The Most Expensive Football Players in 2019
Two years ago, Neymar left Barcelona for Paris Saint Germain after the French club paid a world record-breaking transfer fee for him, 222 million euros (close to N90 billion). Last year, the same team paid a fabulous sum for Kylian Mbappé, the teenage wonder from AS Monaco, breaking the record of the amount paid for a player under 20 (135 million euros or M54 billion). This year, we didn’t see any broken records (so far) when it comes to transfer fees paid by football clubs for players but there were quite a few high-profile transactions completed already this year – here they are.
Christian Pulisic
An American professional football player (they call it “soccer”) may sound unusual even to those into Betway Nigeria sports betting on a daily basis – but here he is among the most expensive players transferred this year. Christian Pulisic was born in Hershey, Pennsylvania, from where he moved to Germany to train with Borussia Dortmund. He graduated the team’s youth academy in 2016, moving to the first team. After just three seasons with the team (the final season is underway), he signed with Premier League club Chelsea this January. He will play out the remainder of the season at Dortmund and make his debut at Chelsea with the new season of the Premier League.
Pulisic is the most expensive American player ever – he left Dortmund in exchange for a transfer fee of EUR 64 million (almost N26 billion).
Frenkie de Jong
Frenkie de Jong is another young and talented player who was the subject of a high-profile transfer deal this year. He started his professional career with the Eredivisie (the Dutch first league) club Ajax in 2016 as a midfielder, making an impression with his dribbling skills and passing range, among others. Three years into his career, he signed with Spanish club Barcelona this January. The Spanish side paid EUR 75 million (N3 billion) for him in advance: he’ll make his debut there in June.
Lucas Hernandez
Lucas Hernandez was born in Marseille to a professional footballer father who played for the local club. He moved to Spain at the age of four where his talent started to show – he joined the youth academy of Atlético Madrid at the age of 11, and he stayed with the team when turning pro. Playing as a left back or a central defender, his game and skill was impressive enough for German club Bayern Munich to keep him on its radar. As a result, he signed with the German club this March – Bayern paid EUR 80 million (N3.2 billion) to have him, making him the most expensive football player this year (so far). He will make his debut in Germany this July.
