Crystal Palace have a habit of turning good players into great ones, and that particular wheel hasn’t stopped turning for a while now.
Under owner Steve Parish’s guidance, sporting director Dougie Freedman’s studious eye for a bargain and manager, Roy Hodgson’s gift for developing players, it’s no wonder that the Selhurst Park outfit have come on leaps and bounds in the past couple of seasons.
Of course, not being one of the Premier League’s ‘big boys,’ with respect, means that the club are always susceptible to the vultures circling for their best players.
One who has done particularly well of late is Marc Guehi, who can now count himself amongst the England internationals vying for a place in next year’s European Championship squad.
The 23-year-old might well have left in the summer if the south Londoners hadn’t slapped a £60m transfer fee in his head, but even that may be considered cheap in the not too distant future.
“It’s an important step forward for him (Guehi) in his career. He needs that international pedigree to go alongside all the games that he’s managing to notch up in the Premier League,” transfer expert Dean Jones said to Give Me Sport.
“One of the big reasons that Palace already valued him over £60million was because they see him as a future England international. Because of his age, they feel like this is a guy that could eventually be worth £100million given the way that the transfer market is going right now.
“His price tag has already gone up, just off the back of this international break.”
Transfer fees have begun to go through the roof, due in no small part to the emergence of the Saudi Pro League and its apparent riches over the summer.
The expectation will be that the Pro League continue to mine European football’s top division’s for the best talent available, and in time, it’s arguable that £100m will be seen as the going rate for any player at the top of his game – unthinkable even a year or so ago.