How much Stoke City paid on agent fees in huge squad rebuild this season
Stoke City spent just north of £2 million on agent fees as they overhauled the squad last summer and in January.
Stoke have made 24 senior signings in all this season as technical director Ricky Martin and manager Alex Neil were tasked with building a team to compete in the Championship almost from scratch after coming through the toughest constraints of a three-year Financial Fair Play cycle. Martin oversaw the January window too after Steven Schumacher had replaced Neil.
It was billed as a rare chance at such a massive reset and recruitment was funded by the sales of Harry Souttar, Jacob Brown, Josh Tymon and Connor Taylor as well as backing from the owners.
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There have been seven arrivals on loan plus 18 permanent signings, including 11 who required a transfer fee. New figures released by the FA show the club also spent £2.087m on agent fees, which was the eighth highest in the Championship.
The most eye-popping figures highlight the discrepancy between the freshly-relegated clubs and the rest. Between them, Leeds United (£13.288m), Leicester, despite their struggles to stay on the right side of the rules (£8.114m), and Southampton (£7.537m) spent nearly as much (£29m) as the other 21 clubs in the division combined (£32.4m).
Watford, Norwich, West Bromwich Albion and Hull also outspent Stoke. Rotherham paid the lowest amount (£441,000) while promoted duo Plymouth (£587,000) and Sheffield Wednesday (£509,000) were also in the lowest three spenders.
In even sharper contrast, a total £410m was spent on agent fees by Premier League clubs.
Agent fees £m | ||
1 | Leeds United | 13.288 |
2 | Leicester | 8.114 |
3 | Southampton | 7.537 |
4 | Watford | 4.693 |
5 | Norwich | 4.277 |
6 | West Brom | 2.176 |
7 | Hull | 2.102 |
8 | Stoke | 2.087 |
9 | Coventry | 1.835 |
10 | Sunderland | 1.606 |
11 | Middlesbrough | 1.444 |
12 | Cardiff | 1.397 |
13 | Ipswich | 1.264 |
14 | Preston | 1.157 |
15 | Huddersfield | 1.151 |
16 | Birmingham | 1.115 |
17 | QPR | 1.054 |
18 | Swansea | 1.035 |
19 | Bristol City | 0.897 |
20 | Blackburn Rovers | 0.894 |
21 | Millwall | 0.682 |
22 | Plymouth Argyle | 0.587 |
23 | Sheffield Wednesday | 0.509 |
24 | Rotherham | 0.441 |