How Leicester made £230m profit then reinvested for more star power
Foxes of Leicester explain how Leicester City made £230Million in profit on player sales – and then reinvested in more future star power.
For some reason – I’m sure there are valid ones, I just can’t see it – some of the vocal section of Leicester supporters criticised LCFC’s Director of Football, Jon Rudkin, heavily in the past. They called for his resignation and the usual abuse was thrown.
I prefer to judge someone on results, and whilst the Foxes have certainly made some awful signings under Rudkin since 2015, they’ve also completely a few of the most profitable in Premier League history. For example, when taking these five incomings and outgoings into account, the amounts are staggering: N’Golo Kante, Danny Drinkwater, Riyad Mahrez, Harry Maguire, Ben Chilwell.
Kante came from Caen, costing the east Midlands side £8.1million; he was then sold to Chelsea cheaply due to a contract release clause for £32m.
Drinkwater arrived via Man Utd for £810k; then he joined Chelsea, too, at a ridiculous £34m. Mahrez was signed from Le Harve for £450k; Manchester City took him at a whopping £61m.
Maguire came from Hull City at around £12m; subsequent to becoming a top centre-back, Manchester United paid approximately £78m for the Englishman’s services. Meanwhile, LCFC academy graduate Chilwell obviously cost nothing and was transferred to Chelsea for a profit of £45m.
That brings the total spent on the five high profile players to roughly £21m. And the gain made on selling those stars is an astounding £250m, before subtracting what was paid out.
Reinvesting for more Leicester City star power
Some of the players to join since and during the time the Foxes offloaded the aforementioned, unassociated quintet are as follows (with their apparent Transfermarkt values bracketed): James Maddison (£50m), Wilfred Ndidi (£50m) Youri Tielemans (£50m), Wesley Fofana (£30m), Caglar Soyuncu (£40m), Ricardo Pereira (£30m), Harvey Barnes (£30m) and Timothy Castagne (£20m).
As anybody can tell, the reinvestment by the King Power outfit is incredible, on and off the field. In fact, some of these contemporary estimates are way off: Fofana is going nowhere unless twice that supposed fee is offered; and Barnes’ potential cost there is also halved.