The Rise of a New Market: Why Top Clubs Should be Shopping in the EFL Championship
In the egregiously inflated transfer market of world football, there remains a sanctuary of players available for lower, better-value prices. The EFL Championship has proven to develop players both physically and mentally while testing them against a plethora of different tactical systems and structures. While we are witnessing more players being purchased from the second flight of England , the biggest names in world football are still vastly underutilising this market. This under usage leaves space for other clubs to swoop in and purchase players for undervalued prices. The clubs that purchase these players can then develop them into essential players for the club or sell them for a much larger price than they bought them for.
The Championship has become a goldmine for talent, especially in the previous two to three years. The league’s tactical diversity and physical impetus causes players to harness their abilities to effectively make a step forward from the second division into the top leagues around Europe.
The most significant indicator that the Championship is incredibly effective at developing players to be ready for top-flight football is the usage of loans by Premier League clubs.
Loans are viewed as invaluable by Premier League clubs that seek to develop and progress the talent and physicality of players not yet ready for top-flight football.
There are currently thirty under-23 players on loan from Premier League clubs to Championship clubs.
In the squads of Manchester United, Manchester City, Liverpool, Arsenal, Tottenham Hotspur, and Newcastle United, 23 players have been on loan to the Championship in their careers.
There is a continual display of players going on loan to the Championship and subsequently arising with experience and intelligence that has allowed them to achieve impressive feats later in their careers. England internationals such as Ben White, Harry Kane, and Kieran Trippier all underwent Championship loans in their career.
Harry Kane’s loan move to Leicester City is an excellent indicator of the development that players undergo in the Championship. While Kane describes this loan move as one of the most challenging times in his career, it is evident that the struggles he underwent helped mould him into the world-class player he is today.
Harry Kane’s Leicester teammate, Martyn Waghorn, stated, “He [Kane] would have taken a lot of positives and I am sure he learned what he needed to improve on and where he wanted to go next.”
The usage of loans reveals the implicit trust in Championship clubs to develop players properly so that they can be ready for Premier League football. There is a relationship between the first and second divisions in England to ensure the betterment of footballers through experience, learning, and, ultimately, improvement.
These top talents are not just breaking through from first divison academies, either. The level of footballing ability in England is developing to such a high degree that Championship clubs are consistently creating talents with ability and potential to play in the top European leagues.
On the biggest stage of world football, at Real Madrid, we have seen Jude Bellingham perform week in and week out with dazzling displays of tenacity, movement, technicality, mental fortitude, and reading of the game. He has become not just one of the best midfielders in the world but a potential shout to be the next winner of the Ballon d’Or. Aged 16, he debuted for his boyhood club, Birmingham City, in the Championship. At the time, he was unproven, and his abilities were not yet fully harnessed, but his potential was gleaming. The physicality of the Championship pushed his physical development and helped improve his adeptness under higher pressure and more challenging scenarios. Jude came through the academy of a Championship team to a Borussia Dortmund side that he captained at age 18, to the biggest club in world football, Real Madrid. Bellingham’s road to glory has indicated that such talent is available in the Championship. And while it would be difficult for any player to match Bellingham’s ability, there is no doubt that other top-notch footballers are coming through in the Championship.
John Stones is another player who developed through the academy of a Championship club, stepped up to a top division team, and is now at a Champions League-winning club. After breaking through the academy and into the first team at Barnsley, John Stones moved to Everton for a minimal fee of €3.5 million. After impressive performances for the Toffees, Stones earned a 55 million euro move to Manchester City in 2016. Stones has become not only a crucial figure in the Manchester City dressing room but is arguably the best centre-back in football at this moment in time. John Stones has developed into an incredibly composed and technical centre-half with superb vision and reading of the game. Stones has been the frontman of Pep Guardiola’s latest tactical development, playing in a hybrid centre-half/first-phase midfielder role. Stones uses ‘la pausa’ to navigate the first and second phases of build-up while discovering and playing balls through the lines. And Stones’s on-the-ball prowess is not traded off by any defensive flaws. The ‘Barnsley Beckenbauer’ is a rock at the back.
Manchester City and England teammate Kyle Walker described John Stones by saying, “You don’t quite appreciate him until you are playing alongside him. He rarely gets beat, he is great on the ball and he is very calm and level-headed.”
John Stones is another primary indicator of first-rate footballers across the pitch breaking out of Championship academies.
Not only is the Championship nurturing talents through the academy system, but it is also acquiring many more high-quality players in the transfer market. The Championship’s acquisition of top players was especially shown through last season’s transfer window, with three forwards moving to highly regarded European clubs.
Victor Gyökeres, Chupa Akpom, and Iliman Ndiaye are three examples of top-quality players applying their trade in the Championship and then receiving a big move. These three forwards played in the Championship in the 2022/23 season and received considerable transfers in the 2023 summer window.
Victor Gyökeres scored 21 goals and joint-topped the assist tally of the Championship with 12. Gyökeres led Coventry City to the Championship playoff final, losing out to Luton Town. Despite not achieving promotion, Gyökeres earned a 21 million euro move to Portuguese giants Sporting CP. He has 16 goals and 7 assists in just 20 appearances so far in the Liga Portugal. And after Gyökeres’s superb performances for Coventry and Sporting, he has been linked with a potential 100 million euro move to Chelsea.
Chupa Akpom moved from Greek side, PAOK, in the summer of 2020 to Middlesborough. Coming into the 2022/23 season, he fell out of favour with manager Chris Wilder and was demoted to the Under-21s. However, after Wilder was dismissed in early October, Akpom found fine form under new manager, Michael Carrick. Akpom ended the season as the league’s top goalscorer with 28 goals in 38 appearances. Ajax purchased the bagsman for €12 million. This season, he has scored 6goals in 14 appearances in the Eredivisie while netting a goal every two games in the Europa League.
Iliman Ndiaye reached 14 goals and 10 assists in the Championship last season. Following automatic promotion from the Championship with Sheffield United, Ndiaye was seen as the man capable of keeping the relegation favourites safe in the Premier League. However, Ndiaye received a €17 million transfer to historic French powerhouse Olympique Marseille. His numbers have not been superb for Marseille this year. Yet, he is still viewed as a tremendously exciting prospect at only 23 years old.
The Championship has now become a league of such high quality that players such as Gyökeres and Akpom can translate their skills from the Championship to the top divisions with little friction. The significant increase in the quality of players at English clubs has caused a knock-on effect in the lower divisions. Improvements in youth development and player recruitment have pushed the English game to such a high level that Championship teams are now picking up and developing talents at a higher level than ever before. The rise in transfers from the Championship to top-flight clubs has been a product of the major development in quality within the English second tier, and now, top-standard players are becoming increasingly available.
Michael Olise, Eberechi Eze, and Adam Wharton are three names who emerged from Championship clubs in recent years. Their standout performances in the second tier earned them a move to Premier League side Crystal Palace for a combined fee of 48 million euros. Michael Olise has become a pivotal player for Palace since his arrival in 2021 and has garnered strong links to Manchester United because of his exceptional quality. Eberechi Eze has also proven to be an exciting prospect for the Eagles and managed to become the club’s league top goalscorer in the 2022/23 season. Adam Wharton only joined Palace in January of 2024, but his controlling and composed displays at Blackburn Rovers have indicated that he will help fill the hole in Palace’s midfield both short and long-term.
Another player who moved to the Premier League in 2023 was 20-year-old midfielder Alex Scott. Scott originally came through at seventh tier club, Guernsey F.C., then moved to Bristol City in January 2020. After an FA Cup loss to Manchester City in February 2023, Pep Guardiola described the young midfielder as “an unbelievable player”. At the end of the 2022/23 season, Alex Scott was awarded Bristol City’s ‘Player of the Year’, the Championship’s ‘Young Player of the Year’, and was name in the Championship ‘Team of the Season’. Bristol City received a club-record fee of 23 million euros for Alex Scott from Bournemouth in 2023. While Scott began the 2023/24 season with a significant knee injury, since his recovery, he has displayed convincing technicality and intelligence through his passing and movement for the Cherries.
Players such as Michael Olise and Alex Scott have the capabilities to be playing for top teams around Europe, yet find themselves at bottom half Premier League sides due to the undervaluation of players that come from the Championship. The significant increase in quality necessitates a readjustment of inference and expectation when it comes to analysing players from the Championship and their fit into the tactical framework of top clubs.
As aforementioned, the Championship’s tactical diversity allows clubs to infer each player’s fit into different tactical ideas with greater accuracy and effectiveness. The Championship induces adaptation in each player due to the constant switch in intensity and game states. In-possession and out-of-possession, tactical ideas and methods are so varied between each club that players in the Championship learn to adapt with greater in-game reading. As well as this in-game intelligence being improved, players gather more knowledge of the game through the classroom sessions they undergo at training.
Recruitment in football is about constant, proactive adjustment. Adjustment in evaluations of players, finances, and areas of interest. With each development in the Premier League every season, there is a parallel development in the Championship.
The finances of the transfer strategy of shopping in the Championship is much more cost-effective, especially in the current landscape of the transfer market. With clubs such as Everton being punished for their breaches of FFP and the likes of Manchester United and Newcastle United pressing against the barriers, the Championship provides a market for these clubs to keep a safe position in the FFP regulations while acquiring first-class players.
One European club that has seemed to latch onto this strategy in a very recent surge of activity is Italian side, SS Lazio. In the January window, Lazio moved with serious intent for Sunderland’s Jack Clarke, Plymouth Argyle’s Morgan Whittaker, and Norwich City’s Jonathan Rowe. While none of these transfers were completed due to each club’s wishes to hold onto these players until the summer, the surge of action demonstrated by Lazio indicates that more and more clubs are latching onto this transfer strategy. Lazio have most likely acknowledged the financial opportunity in purchasing these players for reduced fees. Upon the acquirement of these talents, the club could simultaneously have them perform at a high level in the first team while inflating their price to sell them for a nominal fee at a later date.
Jack Clarke is a player who oozes sheer quality every time he steps on the pitch. The 23-year-old winger is an extremely prolific dribbler and has a superb eye for goal. He has reached 19 combined goals and assists in 33 appearances this season and has, by all accounts, been Sunderland’s best player in their most recent Championship campaign. Clarke is the one to watch when it comes to talent in the Championship, being in the top 1% of both progressive carries per 90 and touches in the attacking penalty area per 90. Clarke’s directness and driving force as he carries the ball has made him appear on the radar of several top clubs all around Europe.
Morgan Whittaker is the Championship’s second-leading top goalscorer, netting 17 so far this season. This season, Whittaker has mostly been utilised as an inside forward from the right wing. Yet, he can play in any position among the front four in several different roles. Whittaker’s left foot is deadly in front of goal, but is not limited to only shooing. Whittaker has the ability to create chances for his teammates. Despite his goalscoring focuses this season, he has the capabilities to play a more secondary role. I would pinpoint Whittaker for a move to Spurs or Newcastle in the 2024 summer window. I could see him rapidly moving up the food chain to being a first-choice forward at either club.
Jaden Philogene has demonstrated his phenomenal on-the-ball ability for Hull City and is helping them on a campaign that could see them finishing in the playoff spots. Jaden is an incredibly deadly winger with immense change of pace, directness, and flair. In one-on-ones, Philogene is incredibly difficult to stop due to his unpredictability and shift of momentum as he carries the ball. His skill set is rounded off perfectly with a balance of trickery and drive. From Philogene’s performances this season, I believe he could perform in a top-half Premier League side or potentially abroad at a Champions League-placing Italian or German team.
And just look at this absolutely outrageous goal:
Hayden Hackney had developed through Middlesborough’s academy system since he joined the club at age nine. He helped Boro’s under-18s to the FA Youth Cup Final in 2019 and was noted for his outstanding performances in the under-23s before being promoted to the first team by ex-manager Jonothan Woodgate. After a loan spell at Scunthorpe United, Hackney was introduced into the Middlesborough first eleven by Michael Carrick in 2022, where he has since excelled. Hackney is an immensely rounded volume passer and ball carrier. He can operate as a 6, 8, or 10, but no matter what, he always wants the ball. Hackney constantly looks to progress the ball but does not ever seem to rush it. Hackney is situated in the 98th percentile of attempted passes, with an average of 87% passes completed per game. To make this already impressive state even more incredible, Hackney is in the 96th percentile of progressive passes completed. This culmination of statistics essentially means that Hackney is attempting a significantly high number of progressive passes and completing an abnormally high number of them. Along with this ridiculously impressive ability to play a high volume of accurate progressive passes, Hackney is particularly adept at carrying the ball through the middle and progressing his team by way of dribbling. If Manchester City were not already so settled with extremely good ball-carriers and progressive passers, I would heavily recommend Hayden Hackney to them. Nevertheless, whichever team that ends up with Hayden Hackney will have an extremely talented midfielder on their hands.
Ultimately, the Championship has proven to be a newfound haven of top-level footballers, and is continuing to do so. Over the past few years, the increase of talent in the league has created an untapped goldmine for top-division clubs to take advantage of. The Championship’s proficiency at developing and polishing young talent, alongside the vast diversity of tactical ideologies and situations in the league, is producing well-rounded, intelligent, and immensely talented players. These players are then available for less inflated prices due to the lower reputation of the league, and the clubs that capitalise on this market will reap the rewards of footballing and monetary success.
*All transfer sums are courtesy of transfermarkt.com
*All player statistics are courtesy of fbref.com
