“Messing about” - Burnley FC blasted for Viktor Gyokeres blunder | OneFootball

The Clarets will bitterly regret the way they handled the proposed deal given the striker's current form for Sporting

Viktor Gyokeres is one of the hottest names in European football at the moment, yet Burnley were one of the frontrunners to sign him just over 12 months ago.

The Sweden international was coming off the back of two extremely strong seasons in the Championship with Coventry City — his final season for the Sky Blues seeing him plunder 21 goals and pick up a further 10 assists.

It was clear the now-26-year-old was ready to make a step-up, and Vincent Kompany’s Burnley — just promoted to the Premier League — were trying to barter with a players-plus-cash deal to reach Coventry’s £20million valuation.

It didn’t work. Gyokeres moved to the Portuguese side Sporting, scored 29 goals in his first season, started this campaign similarly, and is now being valued at triple the price, which still feels like a bit of a bargain.

When we asked Clarets fans about the missed transfer they most regretted, it’s no surprise our Burnley Fan Pundit, Ben, quickly brought up Gyokeres.

Speaking to Football League World, Ben said: “Yeah, Viktor Gyokeres. We tried to sign him last summer, it looked like it was in quite a good position.

“There's been a lot over the years for Burnley where you thought, but the main one would have been, in recent times, Viktor Gyokeres.

“Could have signed him for £20million and we were messing about with it.

“Could also say the same Tella, £20million, we were messing about, we didn't get him after what he did for us.

“But yeah, Viktor Gyokeres, I mean, you look at what he's doing now for Sporting and he'll go on to play for a top, top side.

“Scoring a lot of goals, and how we could have done with him last year.

“Tore the championship to shred for two seasons, was fantastic at Coventry, so yeah, I'd have loved to have signed him. He'd be my number one that I’d like in recent times anyway.”

It would have been interesting to see Gyokeres in the Premier League

The rate at which Gyokeres has been scoring goals over the last few seasons shows he has that striker’s instinct to sniff out a scoring opportunity.

It’s a skill that, when utilised correctly, scales fairly easily into higher leagues. While there’s no guarantee that the Swede would have been a 30-goal striker for a struggling Clarets side, it’s hard to imagine a world where he failed to grab a few goals.

And, as Ben said, that’s something Burnley really could have used last season.

Finishing 19th out of 20 teams, the Clarets managed to score just 41 goals across the entire season, one of the lowest tallies in that campaign.

For measure, that’s only 11 more goals than Gyokeres scored himself for Sporting in the league, in five fewer games.

Of course, the Premier League is an entirely different proposition to Liga Portugal, but Burnley only missed out on survival by eight points — even ten or so more goals in the side across the season could have made a difference.

The money was also clearly there; the club signed goalkeeper James Trafford from Manchester City for £19million plus add-ons.

Burnley’s decision to try and broker a deal using existing players, while Sporting stepped in and stumped up the €24million (around £20million) being asked, will likely go down as one of the worst decisions the club have made in recent years.

It’s little wonder that fans like Ben still have it firmly nestled in their mind, especially with some of the clubs, and prices, that his name is now attached to.