How the search for younger players is driving the Premier League’s internal transfer market
How the search for younger players is driving the Premier League’s internal transfer market. England’s top division buys more teenage players than any top European league, and it’s creating a market all its own The boy prophesied to be the next Frenkie de Jong made a mere 20 first-team appearances in the Eredivisie for Ajax before moving on to Newcastle United this summer.
England’s top division buys more teenage players than any top European league, and it’s creating a market all its own The boy prophesied to be the next Frenkie de Jong made a mere 20 first-team appearances in the Eredivisie for Ajax before moving on to Newcastle United this summer. And once a credible Premier League club came calling, there was little the four-time European champions could do to hang on to a prodigy who would sooner play for the 1968-69 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup winners.
Newcastle were willing to pay $27m (£20m) for him, or north of $1m per senior appearance. De Jong, for what it’s worth, had been a regular in the Ajax first team for two years, before departing for Barcelona at age 22.