I thought Lyon was a bad move for him, and I wrote that at the time. He should have gone straight to the EPL, but he was always going to end up there anyway. If he gets the jump to a club in the top end of that league (i.e. not Leicester) his gamble paid off.
We got our money’s worth out of Moussa Dembele, and no mistake. Not only did we see some sterling performances but we made an enormous profit which is kind of mind-boggling when you think about it. A gain of more than £18 million … in just two years.
Even Bitcoin wouldn’t get you that sort of return … and it’s not over yet, of course.
One of the things we’ve become quite adept at is negotiating decent clauses when players leave our club. The sell-on clause for Van Dijk put another few million into the kitty, and there’s bound to be a similar one for Dembele. How much could we get there?
Reports suggest that Lyon will want around £50 million for him. That’s not as crazy a sum as it sounds, not when you consider what we’ve already had for him. A move to Manchester United – for they are the club reputedly ready to move – would certainly fetch that sum.
Even a 10% sell-on clause nets us £5 million for doing absolutely nothing. That kind of money is likely to be more than any other club – the Ibrox side included – has to spend. Of course, this means nothing if we don’t push forward and actually fund the next manager, but I have confidence that last summer’s fiasco will not be repeated. It can’t be.
Today, in addition to trying to smear the leader of Glasgow City Council, the Record has been pushing a pitiful tale about how a Spanish club is ready to offer £20 million for Morelos; this has already been scorched by the club in question.
But it’s just another nonsense tale designed to make it look as if they have serious interest in their neddish striker.
The truth is, without selling at least one key player – and for decent money – Gerrard is likely to have to make do with loanees and free transfers.
The shocking situation they’ve got into with Sports Direct – where a court verdict on damages and costs is due soon – is only one of several problems facing them in relation to finance, and they know they need to spend to catch us if they are going to prevent our nine and then ten in a row.
Being honest, I can’t see how they put the cash together.
I remember when the first interest in Dembele was being reported in the papers; the same fans who think Morelos will net them a similar windfall sneered at the very idea that we’d get such a mammoth sum for the player.
But he was an established French Under 21 international, on the verge of the main team, and had bagged goals against Manchester City in the Champions League. On top of that, we signed him from England when there was already multi-million pound interest in him there.
There was no doubt we were going to get a monster fee for him.
It must gall them that he might yet net us even more money, but it happens to be true. We are good at this, and there’s no doubt about that. If only we used the cash that we brought in from deals like this, we’d be so far ahead already they wouldn’t even see the dust.