Manchester City signing Semenyo will give Guardiola a quarter of the 20 biggest January signings ever | OneFootball

Antoine Semenyo could break into the top five most expensive January transfer window signings ever, but would still be a mile behind some Liverpool genius.

The Bournemouth forward should move for £65m in January, and the club expected to sign him already feature regularly in this list of the 20 biggest January deals of all time.

20) Galeno (Porto to Al-Ahli, 2025) – £41.7m

Nine years in Portugal was enough for Brazilian forward and one-cap international Galeno, who wished not to examine the mouth of Al Ahli’s gift horse when it came galloping along in January 2025.

A respectable nine goals, seven assists and two trophies since suggest he was right not to hesitate.

19) Xavi Simons (PSG to RB Leipzig, 2025) – £41.2m

Considering the Leipzig recruitment model, the idea was likely always to move record signing Simons on eventually at great profit. They likely didn’t expect that to happen within seven months.

Despite the Dutchman’s best efforts, Leipzig failed to qualify for the Champions League in the season they made Simons’ loan permanent. As a result, he informed them of his desire to leave and the poor thing ended up at Spurs of all places.

18) Nico Gonzalez (Porto to Manchester City, 2025) – £49.9m

Quite comfortably the closest any player has come to replicating what Rodri does for Manchester City, it required a half-season of acclimatisation for Gonzalez to take on board what Pep Guardiola wanted in the middle.

Since then he has become a vital cog in an improving machine. Gonzalez has missed a single game for Manchester City in 2025/26 – and it was one of the few they have lost.

17) Luis Diaz (Porto to Liverpool, 2022) – £49.9m

The transfer which so infuriated Daniel Levy, the supposed master negotiator seething at another club for negotiating. Diaz was a fine addition to further regenerate the Liverpool attack.

They even made a massive profit on the 28-year-old when Bayern Munich started sniffing around. But was the sale of Diaz a catalyst for this rough season?

16) Fernando Torres (Liverpool to Chelsea, 2011) – £50m

It still feels bizarre that Torres played eight more Premier League games for Chelsea than he did Liverpool. The goal haul despite that – 20 at Chelsea and 65 at Liverpool – points to a career trajectory that suffered a sharp fall upon his move to Stamford Bridge.

And yet his four years with the Blues yielded a Champions League and Europa League trophy each, with no Anfield trinkets whatsoever.

15) Ferran Torres (Manchester City to Barcelona, 2022) – £54.7m

Back before Barcelona used economic levers to sign players with money they absolutely didn’t have, the Blaugrana fed their transfer addiction through old-fashioned means like overdrafts and bank loans. We’ve all been there.

They could have plucked Torres from Valencia for £20m or so about 18 months beforehand but shut up that’s why.

14) Bruno Fernandes (Sporting to Manchester United, 2020) – £55m

The most transformative signing at United since Robin van Persie. Just a shame the club are dragging him down with them.

13) Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (Borussia Dortmund to Arsenal, 2018 – £56m)

A miserable end should not obscure a mutually beneficial and temporarily happy union. Only eight players who played in the Premier League era have scored more goals for Arsenal than Aubameyang – and of those players, only Ian Wright and Thierry Henry scored more goals per game. If only he was more punctual and non-negotiable.

12) Diego Costa (Chelsea to Atletico Madrid, 2018 – £57m)

One of football’s greatest mysteries is how Chelsea managed to sell a 29-year-old Diego Costa to Atletico Madrid for £57m despite the striker being very publicly surplus to requirements at Stamford Bridge, as painstakingly proven by Antonio Conte’s text message dumping him straight after they won the title together in summer 2017.

Costa had not played professional football for seven months by the time he returned to the Spanish capital; his La Liga record during that second spell was 61 appearances, 12 goals and 17 yellow cards, as well as an eight-game suspension he received for abusing a referee.

11) Aymeric Laporte (Athletic Bilbao to Manchester City, 2018) – £57.2m

Perhaps swayed by Liverpool breaking the world record for biggest transfer fee ever spent on a defender earlier that same month, Manchester City settled for Laporte.

It wasn’t all a smooth ride but five Premier League titles in six years tells quite the compelling story of a player for whom City recouped £23.6million from Saudi in 2023.

10) Christian Pulisic (Borussia Dortmund to Chelsea, 2019) – £57.56m

It did not going to plan for Pulisic, who might well suggest that playing for and being coached by three different managers in nearly four years at a time of immense upheaval has not helped. Frank Lampard, Thomas Tuchel and Graham Potter all struggled to harness the American’s talents.

And Maurizio Sarri was managing the Blues when the deal was put together. Still, he’s fairing rather better in Milan now.

9) Omar Marmoush (Eintracht Frankfurt to Manchester City, 2025) – £59m rising to £63.2m

A rare case of a January signing immediately thriving in his first half-season before suffering from some delayed growing pains.

Marmoush had an argument for being Manchester City’s best player in 2024/25, contributing eight goals and three assists to a struggling team finding their feet again.

But with Erling Haaland firing and Guardiola figuring things out, Marmoush has found solace largely on the bench as the anniversary of his arrival looms.

8) Khvicha Kvaratskhelia (Napoli to Paris Saint-Germain) – £59.1m

A decent 2024/25 for Kvaratskhelia, all things considered: 13 goals and 11 assists in 51 appearances for Napoli and Paris Saint-Germain, as well as winner’s medals in the Champions League, Ligue Un, Serie A and Coupe de France.

PSG capitalised on Kvaratskhelia laughably low wage in Naples and neither club nor player have looked back since.

7) Oscar (Chelsea to Shanghai SIPG, 2017) – £60m

Receiving £57m for an unwanted Costa was a quite ludicrous magic trick from Chelsea, but even they would be hard pushed to outdo the £60m they raked in for Oscar, practically a reserve, in 2017.

Jamie Carragher described it as “embarrassing” for the Brazilian, but he can probably live with the shame. Or wipe his tears away using crisp £50 notes.

6) Mykhaylo Mudryk (Shakhtar Donetsk to Chelsea, 2023) – £62m

Oh boy. You will have read a lot about this being an £89m transfer but the truth is that Chelsea would only have paid £89m if everything went swimmingly. And it has not.

After we were told the Ukrainian winger only wanted to join Arsenal, he signed an eight-and-a-half-year contract with Chelsea. Almost three years on, Mudryk has flopped hard and is currently on the sidelines after being charged with a doping offence.

5) Jhon Duran (Aston Villa to Al Nassr) – £64.4m rising to £75.3m

Those few weeks when Duran was legitimately probably the single greatest forward ever to walk the Earth were glorious.

Aston Villa and Unai Emery tried to resist his brilliance but could only hold out for so long before indulging on the back of his 11 Premier and Champions League goals in 866 minutes in the first half of the 2024/25 season.

They equally could hardly avoid cashing in when the Saudi coin arrived. And considering Duran can now be found on loan at Fenerbahce less than a year later, it must be categorised as another decisive Villa win.

4) Dusan Vlahovic (Fiorentina to Juventus, 2022) – £66.6m

The football world scoffed along with Vlahovic at the Sophie’s Choice he was presented in January 2022. After breaking numerous records with Fiorentina, the young striker could have taken his pick of interested clubs.

Arsenal were predictably – and justifiably at the time – rejected in favour of a move to Juventus. What could have been. Arsenal might have been spared their biggest mistake of 2025.

3) Virgil van Dijk (Southampton to Liverpool, 2018) – £75m

This was the most expensive January deal ever when it went through on the first day of 2018 and the size of the fee took everyone by surprise. But it turns out that it was basically a bargain for the lynchpin of one of the most formidable teams in Premier League history.

2) Enzo Fernandez (Benfica to Chelsea, 2023) – £106.8m

A deadline-busting deal that was on and off for much of January and only at the very last definitively on. Chelsea ended up going over and above Fernandez’s 120million euro release clause in exchange for a payment structure that suited their needs. Those needs primarily being ‘spread the cost as much as possible across the massive eight-and-a-half-year contracts we give out now’.

Has he been worth it? Meh. Probably eventually.

1) Philippe Coutinho (Liverpool to Barcelona, 2018) – £142m

Liverpool were merely delaying the inevitable when they resisted Barca’s three offers in summer 2017. The Spanish side had to wait half a season and chuck another £20million at the Reds but finally they got their man and Coutinho got his move.

Not that either he or the buying club will look back on the deal fondly. Liverpool, though, haven’t stopped laughing about one of the best pieces of transfer business ever.