The honour of being Lincoln City’s first million-pound player is one that I am sure will eventually be bestowed upon someone.
Some might say it already has been, with Darren Huckerby being home-grown and moving for big sums during his career, but that is tenuous to say the least. What we really want to see is a player leaving our club for £1m, or an undisclosed fee (as is the case these days) which unofficial sources cite as being £1m.
We’ve had some big money sales in the past, Jack Hobbs was believed to be around £750,00 and you wonder if maybe the gate receipts for the Liverpool friendly, as well as sales from around the ground, might have pushed it up towards the £1m mark. Maybe, maybe not, but even if it did it isn’t officially the ‘first £1m players’ for the Imps.
Is that player currently in our squad? Increasingly, over the past few years, players have been suggested as the first £1m export, but as yet it hasn’t happened. For the first time ever, we are perhaps in a good place to achieve the aim and bring in a seven-figure sum. Last time we were at this level, aside from 1998/99, transfer fees were rarely making seven-figures. Most of our history since has been spent in division four or lower and rarely does anyone pay seven figures for a player at that level.
No, the Gods are aligning now and it is very, very possible that in the next year or two, we may see a player move for the magic sum. This division is no stranger to it, Macauley Bonne went for around £2m earlier this season, and Rob Dickie cost a similar amount over the summer. Tariq Fosu, a player we were linked with last summer, went for a big fee in January too. It isn’t unusual for good players in good teams to move for big sums in League One and sadly, as much as we love this squad, that is the aim.
I plan to do an article on the players in the squad who may be candidates over the weekend, but I wanted to give you something different today: I want to give you the players from the past 20 years I believed could be candidates for the honour. Obviously, in every instance, I was wrong, but I firmly felt these five players could have been our first £1m player during their time with the Imps. Please, do bear with me after number one.
Why not head over to our forum and discuss my picks, and maybe suggest some of your own?
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