Is Jamie Vardy Worth £30M to an Established Premier League Side?
More frequently than people would like to admit, but not frequently enough, football provides us with feel-good stories.
Drama, subterfuge and general skullduggery are commonplace, and we often lose sight of the beauty a simple game with simple rules can create.
Leicester City have one such story on their hands—something scriptwriters from London to Los Angeles could not have conjured—in the remarkable and sudden, yet long-suffering, rise of centre-forward Jamie Vardy.
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Released from his hometown Sheffield Wednesday as a 16-year-old, then climbing the ladder of non-League football—until being purchased by the Foxes for a record fee of £1 million in 2012—the Englishman's journey is certainly peculiar. This year (his fourth with Leicester), the once questioned seven-figure sum has been revealed a bargain.
Playing 97 Championship and Premier League matches before 2015/16, Vardy had scored 25 goals. This season, he has 14 goals in 14 EPL appearances—and 24 fixtures remain on Leicester's schedule.
In his current run of form, the division's Golden Boot front-runner broke Ruud van Nistelrooy's 12-year-old record of consecutive Premier League games with a goal, which stood at 10. Vardy's current streak is at 11 matches, with a possibility for 12 straight this weekend vs. Swansea City.
The record, on its own, is of little consequence. Professional strikers are paid to score goals in every game they play—it stands to reason occasionally one will have an extended run of brilliant form, and records like Van Nistelrooy's will come into contention.
Vardy's backstory, however, makes this record, and subsequent moment, more than consequential.
The Dutchman, whose record he broke, was a known world-class commodity when Sir Alex Ferguson bought him from PSV Eindhoven to Manchester United for £18.5 million in 2001. Vardy, conversely, was bought from a non-League Fleetwood Town for relative pennies.
Thus, his current form has every conceivable ounce of underdog greatness everyone loves. Furthermore, with the January window looming, and enjoying the best period of his footballing career—Vardy should be an interesting footballer to monitor when the winter transfer session begins.
Leicester City, behind Vardy's goals (not to be forgotten, though, is Riyad Mahrez, who is another marvelous tale of perseverance), are second in the Premier League table and might feel their ambitions set before the season were too low. Whether they would want to sell their talisman at the height of his value, or keep him and fight for European places, seems their biggest decision of early 2016.
Supposing the Foxes set their price for the England international at £30 million, as reported by the Telegraph's Matt Law, the Premier League's established clubs must decide whether the in-form centre-forward is worth the fee.
If one could be promised to receive what is currently being produced, Vardy is worth far more than £30 million.
His last 14 games have replicated what Lionel Messi might give Barcelona. The Argentine, however, has consistently produced insane numbers for the better part of a decade—much less two months. Hence, while the Englishman might be in Messi-like form, he shall not be confused for the real package.
One could actually make the argument, knowing a cooling-off process is inevitable, Vardy is worth nowhere near £30 million. His largest demerit (off-the-pitch conduct not included, lest it be second) is age.
With Vardy turning 29 on January 11, the process to become a Premier League goalscoring phenom took the 28-year-old too long.
Vardy would be thrilled the opportunity arrived at all, and so would everyone who helped in his journey, but an upper-echelon club (while certainly capable of making the move) cannot exactly justify spending £30 million on a player whose performance is sure to dive and who is reaching the end of his prime.
What has to be understood is that even though goals from strikers are to be expected and scoring them in consecutive games makes for a great graphic or talking point, the actual execution is pure lottery, pure chance, pure luck.
Anomalies happen, but who they happen to cannot be controlled, therefore they can (and will) disappear as suddenly as they arrived.
Could the confidence garnered from this experience give Vardy's game another gear? Only once his streak ends will we discover.
The fact remains, though, an established Premier League club cannot, in good conscience, spend £30 million on a player nearing his 30s, based on one fantastic run of games—and certainly not a footballer whose best seasonal display before 2015/16 was in non-League football with Fleetwood Town.
That said, were this story to get any better—if, for example, the likes of Manchester United or Chelsea (who unarguably require centre-forward assistance) bought the 28-year-old on a three-year contract next winter, and he somehow managed to win the league, or dare the Champions League be mentioned—you can expect "Vardy," in all its cinematic glory, to be in a theatre near you come 2020.
Admit it, you'd pre-order the ticket today if you could.
*Stats via WhoScored.com; transfer fees via Soccerbase where not noted.
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