15 big money transfers of non-league players

Apologies for using the Fishy to shamelessly plug something i've written but here it is anyway.

Vardy Transfer Shows Continued Growth of Non-League Football

A look at Jamie Vardy's £1million transfer to Leicester, what it means for FC Halifax, and a review of 15 non-league players to make big-money moves in the last few years.

http://footballspeak.com/post/2012/05/20/Growth-of-Non-League-Football.aspx

Thanks to anyone that bothers to read it.

Read it the other day tommy...good read as always.

Let's hope our liam wont make the list anytime soon.

Good read, but didn't Dan Burn sign for Fulham from Darlo end of 2011 for around £350k ? I know he didn't make alot of appearances for Darlo, but still that would be the second highest behind Vardy and one missed of your list

Cracking article mate. Also like your article on Ashley Cole, an absolute nob of a man but without doubt the best left back in the world at the moment.

Cheers for the kind comments guys.

Yeah i think you're right cod.gtfc, Burn is one i missed. I was trying to do a lot of it just from memory of players moving but managed to find some i didn't know about. It's very difficult to research for stuff like this on non-league as there really isn't a great deal of resources out there.

The Wealdstone FC Twitter account mentioned that i missed Jermaine Beckford off the list, although his initial big move was maybe a couple of years before the scope i was looking at.

Also some of the fee's may be slightly incorrect as most of them were unfortunately "undisclosed fees".

Your brilliant at writing these, didnt you do the one about the Non League Team of the Year aswell? (If not my apoligises  )
Superbv read, cheers mann

Quoted from marinerfrank

Cracking article mate. Also like your article on Ashley Cole, an absolute nob of a man but without doubt the best left back in the world at the moment.

Have you watched Marcelo at Real Madrid this season Frank

Quoted from bradzmilne

Your brilliant at writing these, didnt you do the one about the Non League Team of the Year aswell? (If not my apoligises  )
Superbv read, cheers mann

Thank you. Nope i didn't do a team of the year article mate i just did a "5 players to watch in the BSP" article - http://footballspeak.com/post/2012/04/18/Blue-Square-Premier.aspx

Good read that, thanks for sharing it.  I will add the site to my favorites, didn't know it existed till now.

Well written and interesting read Tommy.

Hopefully not too controversially, I have to disagree with the underlying premise though. There is simply more money in football; prices for players moving between clubs has appreciated across all divisions over the years and this is why we see the odd 'big' money move involving non-league players.

Transfer price appreciation is not necessarily a sign of continued growth of non-league football. I would go so far as to say it's not really an indicator at all. 'Most everything appreciates in price; regardless of a change in quality or a result of 'growth'.

I would argue that nearly all of the BSP is full-time shows that more money is being spent down here.

That means that players are earning a better wage than they was 10 years ago - without considering inflation.

So where a player rejected at youth level may have gone to university or got a job in a factory they may now feel like chancing it in non-league.

Take Hearn as a prime example.  Last year at Alfreton he was earning a part-time wage whilst being a full-time roofer.  It would be hard for him to progress in non-league if most clubs at this level were part-time and who; in the current economic climate; would chance moving from Alfreton where they have a secure full-time job to Grimsby where they then need to find another job to match their income?

So I would say that the league becoming predominantly full-time has helped bridge the gap and seen more league clubs gamble on non-league players.

Quoted from Tommy

Apologies for using the Fishy to shamelessly plug something i've written but here it is anyway.

Vardy Transfer Shows Continued Growth of Non-League Football

A look at Jamie Vardy's £1million transfer to Leicester, what it means for FC Halifax, and a review of 15 non-league players to make big-money moves in the last few years.

http://footballspeak.com/post/2012/05/20/Growth-of-Non-League-Football.aspx

Thanks to anyone that bothers to read it.

read quite a few of your articles(checked them out the other day following on from your post on Puyol on football speak ) quite impressive

That is a quite a good article, and an excellent read, could do an article like, why will grimsby town do better next season

Quoted from PPMariner

Well written and interesting read Tommy.

Hopefully not too controversially, I have to disagree with the underlying premise though. There is simply more money in football; prices for players moving between clubs has appreciated across all divisions over the years and this is why we see the odd 'big' money move involving non-league players.

Transfer price appreciation is not necessarily a sign of continued growth of non-league football. I would go so far as to say it's not really an indicator at all. 'Most everything appreciates in price; regardless of a change in quality or a result of 'growth'.

That's a good point to make. And that must undoubtedly contribute towards the higher fees being paid even at this level.

I suppose it would be interesting to see if there is an increase in number of transfers from non-league to football league in recent years, or an increase in transfers from non-league that are a success in the football league. Very difficult and would take ages to look into though.

Quoted from jamesgtfc

I would argue that nearly all of the BSP is full-time shows that more money is being spent down here.

That means that players are earning a better wage than they was 10 years ago - without considering inflation.

So where a player rejected at youth level may have gone to university or got a job in a factory they may now feel like chancing it in non-league.

Take Hearn as a prime example.  Last year at Alfreton he was earning a part-time wage whilst being a full-time roofer.  It would be hard for him to progress in non-league if most clubs at this level were part-time and who; in the current economic climate; would chance moving from Alfreton where they have a secure full-time job to Grimsby where they then need to find another job to match their income?

So I would say that the league becoming predominantly full-time has helped bridge the gap and seen more league clubs gamble on non-league players.

Another reasoned argument here. The part-time player with a full-time job is a reason that Russell Slade pointed to as to why he didn't pluck any rough diamonds from non-league while he was here. He referred to it as being difficult to get someone to leave a secure, well-paid job (especially down south) that is topped up with part time footy wages, to move up north to a potentially unsecure future of a year or two's contract of full-time football.

Another thing is that over the years of foreign players coming into the country and making up such a large percentage of Premiership clubs' squads, all the players have shifted down a division. I.E. the players of the standard of the old top division could now be playing in the 2nd tier because of the influx of foreign talent coming in, the old 2nd tier has now filtered down to the 3rd tier etc etc. So this would mean in effect the Conference as it is now could be of a similar standard to what League Two, or rather Division 4, would have been at the start of the 1990's.