Hello and welcome to the TFO podcast I'm John McKenzie and I'm joined as I always am by my good friend and producer Mike Zimmerman Mike how you doing I'm doing good John how are you I'm doing very well because we are on the final straight towards the transfer window closing and by the time this episode comes out we will be free Mike will be free from all of that but that is not what we're talking about

today we're talking about something much more interesting than the transfer window we're talking about deep lying midfielders and particularly why a deep lying midfielders actually costing a lot more these days you've just listened to that conversation what did you make of it I mean I think it's it's the the biggest topic of this transfer window we've seen Kaisedo we've seen rice go for a lot of money last year we saw Kassamiro go for 70 million euros and I think kind of the key takeaway that I have for

that conversation is that the reason why they're moving for a lot of money is that their skill set is actually pretty rare compared to to the rest of the players on the pitch so we got into that and I think that's really fascinating yeah it's a really really fun conversation and I think with that in mind the best thing for us to do is to just jump straight in so here we are talking about deep lying playmakers and the phenomenon of them costing a lot of money

now you may have noticed that something strange has happened in the last few transfer windows that goes against the received wisdom of player fees deep lying midfielders have become much much more expensive so much so that some of them have entered the top 10 list of all time transfers by fee now previously the general rule has been that the closer towards the opposition's goal that a player operates the bigger the fee they command but this is clearly not the case anymore but fortunately I'm joined by two guests who can help us demystify this phenomenon.

So first we've got Stuart James who is one of our senior writers at the athletic and a former player Stu welcome on the show thanks very much for me on and alongside him we have one of the athletics data analyst Mark Kerry who will hopefully throw some numerical answers as well so Mark great to have you on to pleasure to be on John.

So let's begin by talking about the piece that you have written between the two of you it's called Kaiseido Rice Lavia the fees for deep lying midfielders are huge this is why so Stu you are the lead writer on this one what was it that prompted you to write about the value of deep lying midfielders.

Well I do like to come up my own ideas but I can't take credit for this one actually John it was one of the editors in the office the moment it was said I thought that's a great piece to be done it's really really interesting as you said it goes against perceived wisdom

and when you see those big deals now amongst players like in Bappé and Neymar you know in the top 10 list it really makes you stop and think because these aren't players who are creating lots of goals scoring lots of goals we've seen big fees for defenders in the past but perhaps that role of the number six which I think for a long time is probably more thought of as a defensive midfielder and a defensive midfielder almost in a negative sense where people will be able to do that.

People predominantly thought of them as someone who was destructive and there to screen the bat four and to stop the opposition from making him roads into the defense whereas actually now the roles change so much that it's often the real pivot around which the team is built and so much play runs through them from an attacking point of view initially.

So all those things were coming into my mind when I was writing the piece and but the main thing seeing those transfers I know ends up bananas slightly different when I'm sure come on to this because he's probably a few of six he's maybe a frustrated number six and I think there are a few of those around I think Bruno Gamara is probably one of those in Newcastle as well but certainly with rice who's played a lot of his football with England as well as a deeper player and then Kassato at Brighton we're talking about players who are deep lion midfielder sure.

We say and they are there 100 million pounds plus so that seems really interesting to look at.

Yeah and I think you mentioned defenders there it's been a long time since a defender on the ball on door I wonder whether or not we're going to start seeing number six is coming up as potential ball on door winners I don't know.

You guys have any thoughts on that?

Yeah try to think who the last one was but it'd be kind of Varo.

Yeah I think kind of a 2004 maybe.

Yeah well to Stu's point again it's something I'm sure we'll come on to.

It's that wider importance to the team and it does go beyond goals and assists and I would like to speak about more of the advanced metrics that we can look into but even just down to involvement in the play these players these

number sixes are absolutely integral to the attacking side and the defensive side and to Stu's point you don't just have to be a destructive midfielder but you do still have to have that element to your game as well.

Just from the attacking phase but yeah probably no fewer players who have more of an all round game or what they're being asked to do than these players so in terms of importance to the team and contributions to the overall team think about the ball on door it might change

yeah we're lovely to see wouldn't someone like Roger winning the ball on door imagine it can you.

So I've got the table of the biggest transfer fees in football history that it was included in that piece.

I'll run through a few of them now apologies if it is out of date of course because we are recording this before the end of the transfer window which is going to actually end on Friday so a few days time.

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