Transfer fees increased by a third in 2017, despite the fact 84 per cent of deals were free transfers.
Paris Saint-Germain broke the world transfer record to sign Neymar in the summer, but Ousmane Dembélé, Romelu Lukaku and Oscar were all involved in deals last year which crack the top 20 of all time.
Today FIFA has released its annual Global Transfer Market Report, which reveals that fees have increased hugely.
Transfer fees increased by a third in 2017, despite the fact 84 per cent of deals were free transfers.
Paris Saint-Germain broke the world transfer record to sign Neymar in the summer, but Ousmane Dembélé, Romelu Lukaku and Oscar were all involved in deals last year which crack the top 20 of all time.
Today FIFA has released its annual Global Transfer Market Report, which reveals that fees have increased hugely.
Transfer spending reached €5.12bn worldwide, up 32.7 per cent from 2016. Of that spending 75.7 per cent was fixed transfer fees, 16.3 per cent bonuses and 6.7 went to buyout clauses.
The average transfer fee for the top 50 annual transfers is now €48.4m, compared to just €20.4m in 2012.
England saw an 11 per cent increase in players coming in, with 732 incoming transfers. There were 821 outgoing, but that was only an increase of 1.7 per cent.
Italy, by contrast, saw a 9.3 per cent fall in incoming transfers, while there was an increase of 7.2 per cent in players leaving, at 415.
These figures are for all of Italian and English professional football, not just the Premier League and Serie A.
England represented the most valuable stream of transfer income for Italian clubs, with a total of €216.4m spent on players from the peninsula.
Italian spending on players in England was €114.9m, up 12.2 per cent.
Given the huge television rights deal enjoyed by English clubs, it’s perhaps unsurprising that three of the top four inter-country transfer revenue streams involved players moving to England.
The exception was transfers from Spain to France, which places third overall with a total value of €324m.
However, this can largely be explained by Neymar’s €222m move from Barcelona to Paris Saint-Germain.
Italian transfer spending did actually increase by 28.6 per cent to €654m, with just a 4.5 per cent increase in outgoing transfer fees at €508.3m.
French transfer spending increased an incredible 314 per cent, but again this can largely be explained by PSG.
The net spend in Italy was €145.7m, €237.8m for second-place Germany.
Once again though England dominated, with a net transfer spend of €988m, according to FIFA’s transfer matching system.