The CIES Football Observatory has specialised in the scientific estimation of professional players’ transfer value. Issue number 197 of the Weekly Post highlights big-5 league footballers whose transfer value augmented the most in absolute terms since July 2017. At the head of the rankings are Romelu Lukaku (+€56m), Kylian Mbappé (+€50m) and Paulo Dybala (+€47m).

The fresh collaboration with the leading football data company InStat allows us to present exclusive analysis on the performance of clubs throughout Europe. The first CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post of this kind focuses on the percentage of ball possession since the start of the season for teams from 35 national competitions. The highest figure overall was recorded for Celtic Glasgow: 70.8%.

Issue number 195 of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post ranks top division clubs from 31 European associations according to the average age of line-ups fielded since the start of the current season. The lowest figure overall was recorded for the Ukrainian side Stal Kamianske (21.7 years), while the youngest team at big-5 league level so far is LOSC Lille (22.9 years).

Manchester City invested a record value of €853 million in transfer fees to assemble its current squad. This value is €850 million for Paris St-Germain and €784 million for previous record holder Manchester United. The data for all big-5 league teams is available in issue number 194 of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post.

Issue number 193 of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post presents the financial assessments of paying fee transfers carried out by big-5 league clubs during the last summer window. In total, 40 big-5 league clubs out of 98 had a credit balance. The biggest net profit was recorded for Monaco: +€289 million. At the opposite end of the spectrum is Paris St-Germain: -€343 million.

The CIES Football Observatory research team has developed a powerful approach to estimate on a scientific basis the transfer value of professional football players. Issue number 192 of the Weekly Post presents the list of the 110 big-5 league footballers with an estimated value of more than € 40 million. Barcelona’s Neymar tops the table ahead of Tottenham’s Dele Alli and Harry Kane.