Is Riyad Mahrez Justifying his £60m Price Tag?

[Dave]

A slow start and that penalty has been met with a winner against Tottenham and another goal midweek. This begs the question:

Is Riyad Mahrez Justifying his £60m price tag?

@Happy Blue @Dan

[Stan]

Yes. 17 games and 6 goals with a few assists chucked in.

Found his feet there in an extremely talented squad and fits right in now. Happy for him.

[Dan+]

Too early to say for sure. I have maintained all along he is a top quality player who will thrive in better company and that's exactly what he's doing after a pretty slow start. He's not the complete player but he is capable of the absolute sublime and the talent is unquestionable. I think to justify a figure like that though, there's nothing he could really have done by this point - he's so far looking like one of many brilliant options they have at Man City and it remains to be seen what more he can bring when the going gets tougher.

[Happy Blue]

I have to admit @Stan & @Dan was right, he's a brilliant player that fit's our style of play very well  ..bit early to say if he's worth 60million or not, we didn't really need him with Sterling, Sane & Bernardo but he's playing very well at the minute after a slow start

[Dan+]

16 hours ago, Happy Blue said:

I have to admit @Stan & @Dan was right, he's a brilliant player that fit's our style of play very well  ..bit early to say if he's worth 60million or not, we didn't really need him with Sterling, Sane & Bernardo but he's playing very well at the minute after a slow start

I'm glad you like him. It's quite re-assuring for me ever since the first time I watched him I thought he was a special talent. I think he's got too much natural ability to not flourish in a side like yours.

[Harry]

 He's been a modest success so far but does it justify 60m and cities highest value signing ever?

I'd say no but still its not his fault the transfer market lost its shit the year before. 

[SirBalon]

I think we can safely say that top end players (appealing players) for top teams have doubled in price over the past 6 to 7 years and in some case tripled.  Considering this, considering Mahrez' worth to his former club, considering Mahrez was already a Premier League winner and moving within the same league and finally taking into account the clubs that had seriously approached Mahrez over the past couple of years, then we should certainly be able to say that Mahrez wasn't expensive at all and infact reasonably priced.  His form has picked up after moving to a new and very complicated system at Manchester City under Pep Guardiola...  The fee is totally normal and I wouldn't say that there's any reason to question it at all from my point of view.

[RandoEFC+]

Couldn't have asked for much more from him so far. Give him time to see how he develops under Guardiola and gets used to their system, and judge him then. My feeling is that he'll be very successful and justify the fee.

[Harry]

Did they need him though? Are they more at risk of losing a higher potential player in the next couple of years due to seeking more frequent playing time?

12 hours ago, SirBalon said:

I think we can safely say that top end players (appealing players) for top teams have doubled in price over the past 6 to 7 years and in some case tripled.  Considering this, considering Mahrez' worth to his former club, considering Mahrez was already a Premier League winner and moving within the same league and finally taking into account the clubs that had seriously approached Mahrez over the past couple of years, then we should certainly be able to say that Mahrez wasn't expensive at all and infact reasonably priced.  His form has picked up after moving to a new and very complicated system at Manchester City under Pep Guardiola...  The fee is totally normal and I wouldn't say that there's any reason to question it at all from my point of view.

Wasn’t expensive at all and in fact reasonably priced? Let’s be real mate, he wasn’t on the level of Andy Carroll but he was still pretty darn expensive. Third most expensive transfer from within the premier league behind Lukaku and Van Dijk is going to be expensive no matter how you look at it.

[SirBalon]

2 hours ago, Harry said:

Did they need him though? Are they more at risk of losing a higher potential player in the next couple of years due to seeking more frequent playing time?

Wasn’t expensive at all and in fact reasonably priced? Let’s be real mate, he wasn’t on the level of Andy Carroll but he was still pretty darn expensive. Third most expensive transfer from within the premier league behind Lukaku and Van Dijk is going to be expensive no matter how you look at it.

He was signed post-Neymar to a club known to be punished with having all the money they want by just asking the UAE government for it.  He was also signed from a club that held him as their prime prize asset WITHIN THE PREMIER LEAGUE (not shouting with those capitals, just making an obvious point).

The fact you named two mediocre players where status is concerned at the time of signing that have cost more tells us how highly priced the elite are.

Riyad Mahrez' agent held official talks with FC Barcelona apart from other known interested parties like AS Roma... There were also rumours in foreign sports papers with Juve having looked at him long and hard with Real Madrid even taking an interest.  Be it what it may, Mahrez was generating interest and popping up in Europe's top sports pages week in week out.  With that sort of speculation surrounding your player (from Leicester City's point of view) he was sold cheap, cheaper still being to a club in the same league.

It's not mysterious unless someone has been living under a stone since Leicester won the Premier League.

His price tag isn't a talking point!  What's a talking point is if he can learn to play in that system so successfully that he is an indispensable part of the first team.  That has nothing to do with price tag for a club with the present dimensions Manchester a City have for obvious reasons.

[Harry]

9 minutes ago, SirBalon said:

He was signed post-Neymar to a club known to be punished with having all the money they want by just asking the UAE government for it.  He was also signed from a club that held him as their prime prize asset WITHIN THE PREMIER LEAGUE (not shouting with those capitals, just making an obvious point).

The fact you named two mediocre players where status is concerned at the time of signing that have cost more tells us how highly priced the elite are.

Riyad Mahrez' agent held official talks with FC Barcelona apart from other known interested parties like AS Roma... There were also rumours in foreign sports papers with Juve having looked at him long and hard with Real Madrid even taking an interest.  Be it what it may, Mahrez was generating interest and popping up in Europe's top sports pages week in week out.  With that sort of speculation surrounding your player (from Leicester City's point of view) he was sold cheap, cheaper still being to a club in the same league.

It's not mysterious unless someone has been living under a stone since Leicester won the Premier League.

His price tag isn't a talking point!  What's a talking point is if he can learn to play in that system so successfully that he is an indispensable part of the first team.  That has nothing to do with price tag for a club with the present dimensions Manchester a City have for obvious reasons.

Agree with this but the thread question asked was whether he was justifying his price tag. City don't give a darn what the price was as we all know but it won't stop others judging him by that based on their own positions on what is value for money. 

[SirBalon]

14 minutes ago, Harry said:

Agree with this but the thread question asked was whether he was justifying his price tag. City don't give a darn what the price was as we all know but it won't stop others judging him by that based on their own positions on what is value for money. 

Because it's the typical paper talk nonsense we get in this country.  We don't have great sports journalism in the UK at least not in England.  It's 90% based on opinion with no real news and then from there they generate articles and columns based on that opinion which is where you get headlines like this one to pose a ridiculous question which is going to have answers based on opinions.

I know mate... I know that the title leads or tries to lead us down that path but it's such an empty headline and sentence for anyone that barely follows football part-time at the top end.  It's not and wasn't a Primark type price at £60m for sure, but it is a totally normal and justifiably reasonable price for a footballer that had generated tons and tons of sports paper speculation for a considerable amount of time.

Put it this way... How many years back did we (Arsenal) sign Mesut Özil?

I think it was 2013 and we paid somewhere in the region of £43m for him.

Lets measure the influence both players have had in their English adventure within their respective teams with their respective coaches and also taking into account inflation in player transfer fees since then.

Like you said... Van Dijk was signed for £70m+ and one asks based on what exactly other than the fact it was another Premier League club signing him in the publicly known desperation of requiring a defender because he wasn't even an international (I think although it's not that important) for his country.

[Dan+]

1 hour ago, SirBalon said:

He was signed post-Neymar to a club known to be punished with having all the money they want by just asking the UAE government for it.  He was also signed from a club that held him as their prime prize asset WITHIN THE PREMIER LEAGUE (not shouting with those capitals, just making an obvious point).

The fact you named two mediocre players where status is concerned at the time of signing that have cost more tells us how highly priced the elite are.

Riyad Mahrez' agent held official talks with FC Barcelona apart from other known interested parties like AS Roma... There were also rumours in foreign sports papers with Juve having looked at him long and hard with Real Madrid even taking an interest.  Be it what it may, Mahrez was generating interest and popping up in Europe's top sports pages week in week out.  With that sort of speculation surrounding your player (from Leicester City's point of view) he was sold cheap, cheaper still being to a club in the same league.

It's not mysterious unless someone has been living under a stone since Leicester won the Premier League.

His price tag isn't a talking point!  What's a talking point is if he can learn to play in that system so successfully that he is an indispensable part of the first team.  That has nothing to do with price tag for a club with the present dimensions Manchester a City have for obvious reasons.

I still think there's a case to say we got less than we should've to be honest. I think his antics in January knocked some of the fee off, which is a double whammy for us.

[Dr. Gonzo]

Clubs should be allowed to tattoo player that’s leaving cheaper than they would have after their antics like this. Clubs should get me onboard during the contract drafting process.

[SirBalon]

1 hour ago, Dr. Gonzo said:

Clubs should be allowed to tattoo player that’s leaving cheaper than they would have after their antics like this. Clubs should get me onboard during the contract drafting process.

What would be your suggestion as a tattoo? 

[Mel81x+]

3 hours ago, SirBalon said:

What would be your suggestion as a tattoo? 

Starts with a W, ends with an R and has ANKLE with the L missing in the middle to complete the tattoo.