One thing this transfer has taught me is that people need to adapt their thinking to the current market.
A lot has changed even within the last 5 years and people have not adapted their thinking to it.
a. There are rarely any hidden gems on the market anymore. The spread of information due to better scouting, more highlight packages and access to descriptive player data means that every decent club has knowledge of almost every decent player, at least in Europe.
b. Clubs in the big 4 leagues have learnt to slap on big price tags for young valuable players that they have. After the Neymar deal - where signing established players in their prime ages/ who had just come off fantastic seasons became almost impossible, big clubs started trying to sign young players with good skillsets who hadn't yet proven it on a big stage. Players like Vinicius Jr., Camavinga, Tchouemeni, Odegaard, Martinelli etc. In addition, some also brought them into the academy or already had them in the academy - the likes of Rashford, Mount, Saka, Araujo, Valverde, Trent, Reece James, Foden, Pedri, Gavi and Musiala. When you also see how much the likes of Sancho, Joao Felix, Bellingham and Haaland went for, the market has reacted to this by ensuring that selling teams don't miss out financially on young startlets as this is the way teams are building their squads now, particularly in attacking areas of the pitch. Rasmus' fee is a clear indication of that.
c. Premium on cost of strikers - Changing formations and the emergence of wide forwards has led to teams only using one striker as their main man in most teams. There is a general dearth of striking options and this has been apparent for years. City, Chelsea, Bayern and Liverpool have all been forced to adapt to systems using false 9's because they couldn't find a quality striker for a fair price on the market to match what they wanted. To top it all off, there are few physically strong strikers with the type of quality needed to run a premier league frontline. This has led to selling teams recognizing this and putting a premium on the price of a striker. We've seen players like Lukaku, Morata, Werner and Nunez go for exorbitant fees. We've also seen teams relying on older strikers to lead front lines for as long as they could. In 2023, decent strikers from any of the big 6 leagues aren't being sold for anything less than 50m. In Rasmus' case, his youth and physicality added to that cost.
The price is simply a reflection of the market. Rival fans have had to go through this and will have to at some point. We rolled the dice on a player we felt could provide value to us in this role for the next few years. If he had already had a 20 goal season, he would be quoted at 100m and we would have had more of a bidding war for him.
