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Pulisic, Van Dijk or Coutinho: who's the most expensive winter transfer ever?

By Fredi Roman

Not only new seasons bring the expensive transfers in soccer, but the winter market sometimes is also set to show up some huge deals.

Not only new seasons bring the expensive transfers in soccer, but the winter market sometimes is also set to show up some huge deals.

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Winter transfer market sometimes seems to be irrelevant compared to the summer one. Many of the big transfers are done in June, when free agents look for new options and some of the young stars are signed after a good competition. But now, we want to pay tribute to the cold period in which some signings shock the world.

The podium is opened with French-Basque center back Aymeric Laporte. He was playing for Athletic Bilbao when Manchester City decided to go for him. It was the last day of winter 2018’s transfer market, and the English side paid €65 million for him, which equal $78.65 million.

Second place goes to Dutch sensation Virgil Van Dijk, considered the world’s most expensive defender in history. Southampton received €84.7 million, which would be converted into $102.5 million. He signed a few days before Laporte, on January 1, 2018. But he is not the most expensive one.

“Salah, oh Mané, Mané, and we’ve got Firmino… but we sold Coutinho”, were singing Liverpool fans, to the beat of ‘Sugar’ by The Archies. That was because on that transfer market, the Reds paid for Van Dijk by selling Philippe Coutinho to Barcelona. The Spanish side paid no less than €145 million. How much is that in United States? $175 million.

What about Christian Pulisic? He just missed the podium, he was the fourth most expensive winter transfer ever, after being sold to Chelsea for €64 million, $77.44 million in USA. That was in January 2019 despite he stayed six more months on loan at Borussia Dortmund.


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