Usually, a smaller country which produces a big name Premier League player ends up treating their prodigal son as a national hero.
But in the case of Moises Caicedo, the most expensive football in Ecuador’s history (by such a large margin that you could add up most of the remaining top 10 and not reach his vast transfer fee), it seems his domestic press are a little lukewarm.
El Universo have just published a pretty damning piece which looks back on his first month as a Chelsea player following a €116m move from Brighton:
“A crazy sum for a midfielder… with no goal, no header, no mid-range shot, no dribbling… it sounds strange… that a club has agreed to pay such a huge amount for a “worker.”
“A player who hardly ever gets into scoring position cannot be priced above great strikers. When you pay $146m for a player you expect him, if not to be a genius, at least to have a minimally adequate performance. And Moises has not had that so far.”
Frankly, we agree with most of that. We needed a player with Caicedo’s profile, but it feels like there were better options out there for half the price. And how can you spend so much on a player who doesn’t score goals when a lack of goals is your team’s main issue?
Even if he goes on to be consistently excellent for us, could we not have signed him for a lot less? Time and again we bowed to Brighton’s demands. No wonder they thought they could ask what they like.