If you think Liverpool letting Trent Alexander-Arnold, Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk run their contracts down is an unforgivable oversight, imagine how Arsenal fans felt in the summer of 2017.
The north London club had allowed seven first-team players to enter the final year of their deals and free to talk to clubs outside England midway through the season.
It included key, bankable stars Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil, as well as Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Jack Wilshere, Santi Cazorla, Kieran Gibbs and Wojciech Szczesny.
But when Arsene Wenger was asked about the situation during pre-season he was remarkably relaxed and, almost a decade later, surprisingly prescient about the development.
“In the future, you will see that more and more, players going to the end of a contract,” Wenger said.
“Why? Because transfer [fees] become so high, even for normal players, no one will want to pay the amount of money that is demanded.
“I’m convinced that in the next 10 years it will become usual.”
At the time, Paul Pogba’s £89m move to Juventus from Manchester United was the transfer record. Three days after Wenger’s comments, Paris Saint-Germain signed Neymar from Barcelona for £200m.
What happened to those Arsenal players? Sanchez was swapped for Henrikh Mkhitaryan at Manchester United. Ozil signed on for three and a half more years.
Oxlade-Chamberlain, Jack Wilshere, Santi Cazorla, Kieran Gibbs and Wojciech Szczesny moved on. The club got £35m for Oxlade-Chamberlain – more than twice what they paid for him.
Two years later, Aaron Ramsey became one of the first major players to move on a free when he signed for Juventus, banking much of what would have been his transfer fee in £400,000 per week wages.
And Wenger has fundamentally been proven right. Losing Alexander-Arnold, Salah and Van Dijk on free transfers doesn’t have to be a disaster it at first glance appears, for several reasons.
With clubs now forced to keep wages to a certain percentage of revenues under new financial rules, it cuts some huge burdens on the wage bill.
Conor Bradley has been brilliant when he has deputised for Alexander-Arnold, and a move to Real Madrid in the summer, which appears increasingly likely, would free up space for the 21-year-old to flourish.
There is a high chance that one, if not both, of Salah and Van Dijk will extend their contracts. But even if they don’t, Liverpool’s recruitment system identified Salah and Van Dijk, it identified Luis Diaz, Alexis Mac Allister, Sadio Mane, and so many others.
The challenge going forward will be to find the next replacements who don’t cost a fortune in wages (Diaz was reportedly on £55,000 per week when he joined Liverpool) and there is every chance they will do it.
And while the Liverpool trio’s free agency has dominated the headlines, there are plenty of other Premier League clubs with similar predicaments – just as Wenger predicted.
Everton’s Dominic Calvert-Lewin can currently speak to clubs abroad and leave on a free transfer this summer. Newcastle United were reportedly in talks to pay £40m for the striker last summer.
It was claimed Tariq Lamptey was rated as a £40m-£50m defender when he was linked with Arsenal and Manchester United in 2022 – his contract is running down at Brighton.
Kevin De Bruyne will make a decision on his future when his Manchester City contract expires in six months.
Chris Wood, whose 11 Premier League goals this season have propelled Nottingham Forest into Champions League contention, can leave for free this summer.
Kyle Walker-Peters, a full-back who has played for England and was once valued at close to £30m, is in the same position at Southampton.
It could well be that the Alexander-Arnold, Salah, Van Dijk contract situation is evidence of a shifting transfer market, rather than a catastrophic failure of contract management.
Signs of the mega transfer fee becoming a fragment of the past, or extremely rare, with players largely representing clubs until the end of contracts before moving around freely, banking the money themselves.
There was a brief spell when it looked like the Saudi Pro League would offer new money to keep the transfer bubble inflating, but even that has flattened, with more emphasis placed on developing local talent.
We already saw last year Kylian Mbappe walk away from Paris Saint-Germain for free six years after the French club spent £130.5m to buy him from Monaco.
And even PSG, who turbocharged transfer inflation with Qatari money, have been burned by their experiences and changed tact.
When they appointed Luis Campos as sporting director in 2022, PSG president Nasser Al-Khelaifi told Marca that Campos “has a clear aim of course, different, with other targets in the market”.
“He is looking for young players who are talented, committed and have a winning mentality,” Al-Khelaifi said.
“People who will give their all for this badge. We want to be stronger together, we want the players to play more for each other, as a team and a club first and foremost.”
When even the billionaires are suggesting that transfer fees in football are getting a bit much, you know a ceiling has been reached.
And there is one small aspect to all this that is possibly being overlooked in Liverpool.
Some evidence suggests players perform better in the final year of a contract.
Players, such as Jack Cork, have admitted it plays a psychological factor. Ralf Rangnick thought Pogba was playing well in the final year of his second spell at Old Trafford to impress potential suitors (Pogba – who let his contract wind down at United, twice).
The perceived uncertainty is certainly not having a detrimental effect on Salah, who has 17 goals and 13 assists to his name in the Premier League already. Nor Alexander-Arnold, having a brilliant season. Nor Van Dijk, back to his phenomenal best.
If all three star in another title-winning season, not only will it be priceless to Liverpool fans but the world’s best players will be queuing up to replace them.
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