Chester Perry wrote: ↑Fri Aug 08, 2025 12:38 pm
An interesting piece today in the 'Inside Football' newsletter of The Independent's Miguel Delaney about the summer transfer window, PSR and in particular Chelsea - a club we are seemingly signing 3 players from this summer and no one would be surprised if there was a loan forthcoming too - it is something, selling unwanted players, that they appear to do better than anyone else.
Do you have any theories about how they can do this?
The piece ends with an interesting discussion that is just as relevant to us following the sale of James Trafford, one to consider particularly if Esteve leaves next summer as many are already anticipating
The art of the sale
This time of year always brings focus on buying players, but the other side of that, and successfully selling, is now becoming crucial. Also this week:
As details filtered through on Sunday that Chelsea were selling Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall to Everton for an initial £25m, one central figure at a major rival just puffed out of his cheeks: “How are they doing it?”
For his own club, it's an awkward question – why can’t they do deals in the same way? – but one way or another, the extent of Chelsea’s income from sales this summer has made an impression on many in football. The Stamford Bridge hierarchy has already recouped at least £150m in this window, with the potential of more to come.
And that’s with clubs knowing they needed to sell due to PSR pressures and the UEFA judgment, as well as the fact some of those they offloaded were unwanted – especially Joao Felix.
How Manchester United must look at that situation with envy. They have PSR pressures of their own, and it’s well known that they badly want to sell unwanted players. Then again, they’ve seen some of Chelsea’s approach up close. United discussed the idea of Alejandro Garnacho going to Stamford Bridge with Nicolas Jackson potentially going the other way, only for Chelsea to insist it was £80m for the Senegalese forward. Chelsea will probably end up getting it, too, given how this window has gone.
They have been very good at selling, a simple sentence that is actually a lot more significant than it sounds.
There’s a real skill to it, and a necessary one. While this time of year naturally sees most focus on the other side of transfers, and a club successfully buying a target they want, being able to offload when you want is now almost as important.
It’s actually increasingly how the market moves. In a world of PSR, where “headroom” is a watchword, and one Premier League chief executive admits you often have to sell before you want for those exact purposes, it is no longer good enough to just buy who you need and hope you can balance the squad later.
That’s now a market disadvantage. There has to be much more planning and strategy to it.
The big question, that many clubs are now thinking about a lot, is how. Most recent Champions League qualifiers – from Aston Villa through Arsenal, Manchester City and United – have to think about it a lot this summer.
It is, of course, little surprise that Brighton have become the masters of the sale, recouping well over £400m since 2021 but continuing to improve. Unlike their famous analytics-based recruitment model, however, selling is far from an exact science. It’s almost the opposite, involving more old-fashioned qualities. If the numbers can still tell you when is a good time to sell, actually completing moves is more dependent on relationships and contacts, of the ability to trade and barter in the more classic sense.
Chelsea employing two sporting directors is notable there, with both of them – Laurence Stewart and Paul Winstanley – having worked at “selling” clubs, one of them being Brighton. It helps that co-owners Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali have been so engaged in player trading, too. They're both said to love it.
This partly explains why Arsenal opted for Andrea Berta to succeed Edu as sporting director. The Italian has become well-versed in intense squad turnover in all sorts of situations at Atletico Madrid, and knows virtually everyone in football. It will be needed, as there isn't that much money in the market outside England, and most clubs want loans.
The art of the sale is not just about your ability to get deals done, though. It’s also about when you sell and why.
Brighton, unlike a lot of clubs, don’t get emotional about it. They don’t see selling star players as any reflection of their status. That’s why they have instead improved their status.
Brighton have their analytics set a value for a player and they stick to it, willingly agreeing to a deal when that value is met. Bournemouth have begun to follow that model, and are now insistent on seeing all recruitment in terms of who can fit their game model.
There’s also an extra value to that, since such clubs become more attractive to promising talent. They know they’ll be given a chance, both to play and move on.
Some in the game even believe that Crystal Palace “have to get better at selling” in order to show this. Such sentiments echo long-time criticisms of Spurs. There’s a belief that chairman Daniel Levy got too hung up on the idea that selling stars reflected negatively on the club. Spurs arguably failed to kick on because of that, especially in Mauricio Pochettino’s time.
All of which brings us to the saga of the summer: Alexander Isak. Newcastle United are feeling “bruised” because they felt another Champions League qualification had put them on the sort of level where they could keep the forward. Isak has instead agitated to leave.
There’s an argument that this need not be a problem at all. If you are a club on the up, it arguably makes even more sense to sell big and replenish. Juventus used to specialise in this during their peak, going back to Christian Vieri and even Zinedine Zidane.
The difference was that their structure ensured they already had a plan in place for what was next. They had considered all sides of such deals. Many Premier League clubs, including Newcastle, are belatedly realising just how important that is.