BINH DUONG
The transfer of young goalkeeper James Trafford to Burnley for £15 million is a typical example of Manchester City's effective player sales in recent years.
The Trafford goalkeeper will play for Burnley in the Premier League next season. Photo: Getty Images
Trafford has only played in League One for two seasons, with a total of 78 games, and has not started a single game for the Man City first team. However, the 20-year-old goalkeeper has helped the home team pocket £15 million, which is almost the amount Manchester United would have received if they had sold midfielder Fred to Fulham.
Another product of the Man City academy, midfielder Shea Charles, is also set to join Southampton in a £15m deal. Charles has been with Man City since the age of nine and he certainly won't be the last young player to bring in big money for Man City this summer. Man City also have Tommy Doyle, Taylor Harwood-Bellis, Callum Doyle, Josh Wilson-Esbrand, Luke Mbete and Finley Burns. If these players, all under 20 years old, cost an average of £10m each, they would help the Etihad Stadium team earn £60m.
Analysis of the spending and player sales of the Premier League’s “big six” clubs since 2013 shows that Man City have made the third most profit from player sales, with nearly £570 million, behind only Chelsea (£1.2 billion) and Liverpool (over £600 million). Among the players Man City have sent away are Alvaro Negredo, Kelechi Iheanacho, Ferran Torres, Edin Dzeko and youngsters Enes Unal and Douglas Luiz.
Last summer, Man City spent big to recruit the best players Erling Haaland, Kalvin Phillips, Manuel Akanji, Sergio Gomez but still made a profit. Part of the reason was that they also sold young players Gavin Bazunu, Sam Edozie, Juan Larios and Romeo Lavia to Southampton for a total of £38 million.
Lavia joined the Man City academy at the age of 16 and was highly rated but the club were forced to let him go to have more regular playing time in the Southampton first team. Man City also included a buy-back clause, as they did with the other three deals. These clauses have brought in “big money” in the past few years, such as £7.2m when Pedro Porro moved from Sporting to Tottenham and £10m when Jadon Sancho joined Man United from Borussia Dortmund.
Man City’s strategy is to identify top young players who are not yet good enough to play for the first team, then send them to sister clubs around the world to hone their skills and contribute to those teams. The best players, like Luiz and Porro, can then be sold for a profit. The global “empire” City Football Group owns Man City and many other clubs.
Man City will benefit a lot in the future because their training facilities and Chelsea are among the best in England today. The quality of the "product" has also been proven through the titles won: Man City's U18 and U23 teams have won the domestic championship for 3 consecutive years, while 38 young players of the club have been called up to the England teams, from U15 level to the national team.
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