All transfer fees in football are mad, always have been. They thought the world had gone potty in 1905 when the first four-figure transfer took place, Alf Common going from Sunderland to Middlesbrough for a fee of – oh lor, oh blimey, they couldn’t believe it – £1,000. The back pages declared it was the end of football as we knew it, the game ruined.
Over the decades, footballers’ salaries have also led to endless tut-tutting, even during this period of maximum wages. We experts on the terraces always knew there were back-handers – half a crown and a packet of Woodbine in their boots after the game.
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