The history of football has forever seen big-name players move between clubs for transfer fees or even on free. The growth of the transfer market in football is one of the most surprising sub-plots in modern football that can be both exciting and nerve-racking for football fans, especially since the introduction of the transfer window and the Bosman ruling, with transfer records constantly being broken and players always on the move. Because of this, there has been many transfers that literally shocked the world whether it’s for a ridiculous transfer fee or players moving to bitter rivals. Here we’ll take a look at famous transfers that shocked the world.
Kicking off our list isRobinho’s famous transfer from Real Madrid to Manchester City in 2008. This was a deal that made deadline day famous in England. The blues were bought by super wealthy Sheikh Mansour’s Abu Dhabi group and stunned the premier league by purchasing Robinho for £32.5m who thought he was on his way to Chelsea. Brokered by Chris Nathaniel, football agent this was seen as a big statement from City as it showed that they meant business.
One of the most surprising transfers on our list is Carlos Tevez and Javier Mascherano to West Ham. Anybody that was following football in 2006 knew that both Tevez & Mascherano were both highly touted wonderkids with growing reputations around the football world. However, few imagined that the Argentine pair would sign for the struggling east London club before the transfer window shut in 2006. It was literally computer game stuff. It later got revealed that a number of clubs turned down the chance to sign the pair because they were owned by third parties and the pair shouldn’t have been allowed to join the Hammers.
One of the most controversial transfers of all time was Luis Figo’s move from Catalan Giants Barcelona to bitter rivals Real Madrid for a then world record fee of £37 million. “I want to reassure fans that Luis Figo, with all the certainty in the world, will be at the Camp Nou on July 24 to start the season.” Was the words utter by Figo himself on July 9, 2000. This transfer shocked the world because Barca was close to the peak of their powers and the Portuguese legend was their talisman. Transfers between the bitter rivals had taken place before but we had never seen one side bullied into losing a player in this fashion. Figo went from being a cult hero in Catalonia to the most hated man on planet earth.