How Bristol City made millions from underrated Ipswich Town transfer agreement | OneFootball

Bristol City got their scouting right when they paid Ipswich £3.5 million for Adam Webster in 2018, even though he only stayed a year at Ashton Gate.

Bristol City hit the jackpot when they brought in Adam Webster from Ipswich Town for £3.5 million in 2018.

Even though he didn't stay long at Ashton Gate, they made a handsome profit for him.

By the summer of 2018, Bristol City supporters had a lot to be optimistic about.

Their team had returned to the Championship two years earlier, and their performances over those two seasons had seen the team finish 17th and 11th, a solid level of improvement after a season reacclimatising to life back in the second tier.

On top of this, a run to the semi-finals of the EFL Cup had seen them beat Manchester United before a 5-3 aggregate defeat to Manchester City left Pep Guardiola praising the way they'd played.

There was reason to be optimistic that the Robins could push higher still, towards a possible place in the Premier League.

Adam Webster had impressed at Ipswich before leaving for Bristol City

Reinforcements were needed during the summer, and at the start of August they paid Ipswich Town £3.5 million for a talented young defender who'd had an impressive, if injury-interrupted, two years at Portman Road. Adam Webster was on his way to Ashton Gate.

Webster had started his career at the then-crisis-stricken Portsmouth in 2011, making his debut at 17-years-old the following year and staying with them until 2016, when Ipswich Town paid an undisclosed fee - reported to be around £700,000 plus defender Matt Clarke - for him.

Webster had an excellent, if interrupted, two seasons at Ipswich. He went on to make 51 appearances for them over those two seasons.

Brighton's offer for Adam Webster was too good to turn down

Webster certainly did his research before agreeing to the Bristol City move. Speaking to the club's website and reported by the East Anglian Daily Times, he revealed that "Since I’ve known about the club’s interest, it was always something I wanted to pursue and I can’t wait to get started."

He had been impressed by a conversation with manager Lee Johnson, and had even spoken to three of his Ipswich team-mates who'd spent time at Ashton Gate: "I spoke to all three of them and they had nothing but positive things to say about the club and the city so it was a no-brainer."

There was an element of gamble about his signing.

The £3.5 million transfer fee was a relatively big one, but there were reports that it could rise as high as £8 million, depending on various clauses.

With his injury record over the previous couple of seasons, it was understandable that Bristol City would have wanted to tie how much they paid for him to how much he played for them.

They needn't have worried. Webster had an extremely impressive 2018-19 season, even though Bristol City couldn't quite crack getting a place in the play-offs. He made 44 appearances for the Robins that season, scoring three times, and running up almost 4000 minutes in game time. They finished in 8th place in the table, just four points off a play-off place.

But it turned out that his stay at Ashton Gate would be a brief one.

Premier League Brighton & Hove Albion had seen what Bristol City had seen in him, and they were prepared to pay a lot of money to take him to the Sussex coast.

He's already drawn a lot of attention from Premier League clubs by this point. Aston Villa had a £12 million bid for him rejected, but Brighton's bid, which was formally undisclosed but reported as being £20 million, was too good to turn down. I

t was a fee that broke Brighton's previous record.

Bristol City fans will have been disappointed not to have seen more of Webster, but this was a transfer that ended up working out for everybody.

Webster became a mainstay of the Brighton defence, and has run up well over 100 Premier League appearances for them in the six years since he went there.

And although Bristol City still haven't reached the top flight since then, with this signing they demonstrated a masterclass in recognising the value of a player, agreeing a fee which was based on his potential to improve, and then flipping the sale to turn a huge profit in just twelve months.