Manchester United have finally signed Bryan Mbeumo. It was something of a saga between United and Brentford: two bids were submitted in quick succession, followed by a month-long stalemate that only seemed to be broken by Newcastle’s pursuit of Yoane Wissa, sparked by Liverpool’s pursuit of Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitike. In the end, a total fee of around £71 million (£65 + 6 million addons) was agreed, the figure that Brentford had reportedly been asking for from the start of negotiations.
But was this transfer sensible? In this article, I want to analyse the fee that United have paid for Mbeumo by comparing him to similar players and looking over the current transfer market. There’s no doubt that Mbeumo is a good player – but have Manchester United once again overpaid for their talent? Let’s find out.
Player Analysis
There is a lot of content out there regarding what Mbeumo brought to Brentford last season. I even wrote an article myself on him in January. However, it’s always worth refreshing the memory on his talents.
Looking at his numbers last season compared to other attacking players in Europe’s top 5 leagues, we can see clear strengths in Mbeumo’s game. He’s a creative force, both through carries, shown by high percentile rankings for progressive carries (77), carries into the penalty area (89) and take-on success (77), and passes, shown by high rankings for progressive passes (74), key passes (82) and passes into the penalty area (80).
Off the ball, Mbeumo’s 91st percentile ranking for duel success bodes well for Amorim in regards to pressing. Don’t be fooled by his lower percentile rankings for tackles and interceptions – these numbers are possession adjusted, and Brentford ranked 15th for possession in the Premier League last season. Something that isn’t a major issue either is his low aerial duel success. Mbeumo is 171cm (5’8”), and attacking midfielders aren’t usually called to win aerial battles, so this can safely be ignored.
Mbeumo tends to like to act out wide on the right side of the pitch. He can cut inside onto his left foot for shots, or make passes into the penalty area from that right half-space. He can function as a touchline winger using his pace and dribbling ability, or as an inverted winger – the type of versatility that Amorim likes with his attacking midfielders. He has also played in a striker role for Brentford, granting United some positional flexibility.
However, Mbeumo’s top trait is his top percentile ranking for non-penalty goals minus expected goals. In other words, he is in the premier group of finishers in Europe. He doesn’t shoot much (Brentford ranked 15th for shots per 90 in the EPL), and doesn’t shoot from especially great positions (npxG per shot, 34th percentile), but when he does pull the trigger, he normally hits his target.
Now that we’ve established Mbeumo’s talents, let’s take a look at the financials behind the transfer.
Why £65 million?
Two sets of rumours circulated around the football sphere whilst fans waited for United’s third bid. The first stated that Brentford’s evaluation of Mbeumo came from the fact that United had paid £62.5 million for Matheus Cunha, who they believed wasn’t as good. The second set of rumours suggested that Brentford had increased their asking price for Mbeumo due to the prices that other clubs were now paying for players in the forward market, with Anthony Elanga’s £55 million move to Newcastle and Noni Madueke’s £52 million move to Arsenal being used as examples. So, the question is, given all of those transfers, was Mbeumo really worth £65 million?
First looking at Matheus Cunha, one thing to immediately notice is the Brazilian’s top percentile ranking for xG overperformance. United this season have signed last season’s top two xG overperformers, which depending on regression to the mean, could be a very smart or statistically short-sighted move.
Now making direct comparisons to Mbeumo, Cunha offers slightly more creatively via passes, but offers less through carries. Whilst Mbeumo is more successful in defensive duels, Cunha offers a lot more volume through his shots, which coupled with his finishing ability, makes him a more likely goal threat.
So, can we say that Mbeumo should cost more than Cunha? To Brentford, the pure fact that Mbeumo racked up 20 goals and 7 assists last season, more than Cunha’s 15 goals and 6 assists, means that the Cameroonian should require a larger fee. However, when we look at both player’s underlying numbers as we’ve just done, we can now argue that Mbeumo isn’t worth £8.5million (if addons are achieved) more than Cunha.
Noni Madueke’s move to Arsenal is another transfer that puts a question mark on United’s transfer strategy. Madueke is an interesting case (one that deserves its own separate look), in that his numbers and ability seem not to matter much to Arsenal fans, but on paper, the move is very smart as either a backup to Bukayo Saka, or as potential competition to Gabriel Martinelli on the left. In any case, putting Madueke next to Mbeumo doesn’t shine a particularly amazing light on United’s new signing.
A quick look at the shape of his percentiles shows us that Madueke is a lot more active off the ball than Mbeumo. As mentioned before, Chelsea’s high possession numbers make Madueke’s possession-adjusted defensive numbers look better, but for a club like Arsenal, who have similar possession numbers to Chelsea, these numbers are more than okay. Off the ball, where Mbeumo excels in quality, Madueke excels in volume.
Volume is the key word to associate with Madueke. He ranks in the top percentile for carries into the penalty area and the 2nd highest percentile for progressive carries. A high ranking for expected goals suggests that Madueke is adept at getting himself into good goalscoring positions with those carries, and he’s not afraid to shoot either. However, his final output isn’t the best. He ranks low for performance on xG (6th), and whilst a high number of penalty area touches can seem like a good thing, it can also suggest indecision in the box, which can undermine those opportunities that he creates with his ball carrying.
All those stats aside however, what we need to note is that Arsenal paid an initial £48 million for Madueke. Is Mbeumo worth approximately £20 million more than Madueke? Noni is still 23 years old, and that final shot placement or urgency in the box can be trained into his game still. Players of his age are usually bought based on their potential, and whilst his game is a bit raw, he has bounds of potential. Mbeumo is at the peak of his powers currently, and looking at these numbers, it’s not unreasonable to suggest that Madueke’s peak may well eclipse what United will get.
The key difference is likely in squad role. Mbeumo has been Brentford’s talisman (I’ll accept Wissa too) this season and would require the club to head into the transfer market to find a suitable, first team ready, replacement. However, Madueke has been purchased from a club who collect wingers for fun. In fact, Chelsea have just signed Jamie Bynoe-Gittens from Borussia Dortmund, so selling Madueke would have hardly been a massive inconvenience for Enzo Maresca. Given this scenario, that £48 million transfer fee is a massive bargain at a perfect time for Arsenal – the opposite of the scenario United found themselves in regarding Mbeumo.
Either way, based on Madueke’s move and the anchoring heuristic placed by Brentford through Matheus Cunha, United will probably feel like they have overpaid slightly.
However, to save face, United executives could point to the signing of Anthony Elanga as a reason to justify the money they’ve spent. Whilst the ex-United player does have value in his carrying, he doesn’t (at least, on paper) stack up to the numbers that Mbeumo put up last season in all areas. Newcastle paid £52 million for the Swede, and arguably, Mbeumo is around £15 million better than Elanga. Of course, these are subjective judgements, but in this case, it’s a judgement that will help United fans sleep at night.
To conclude this bit of analysis, we can say that whilst United probably did pay a bit more than they needed to, it’s not a gross overpayment of the likes we’ve seen in the past. Arguably, United’s second rejected bid of £62.5 million, the same amount they paid for Matheus Cunha, was the fair market price. However, with Newcastle plotting to sign Wissa – which would undoubtedly take Mbeumo off the market – United needed to act quickly.
All this to say: Yes, paying £65 million for Bryan Mbeumo was a good enough deal.
Why Mbeumo?
Now that we’ve established that £65 million is a fair price for Mbeumo, now we can question whether he was the right signing to go for. Was there a cheaper, more cost-effective option on the market? For that, we can look at similarity scores to see which players played most like Mbeumo last season. Knowing that United want an Mbeumo-type player, there may have been a player out there that could provide something similar and to a decent level whilst also costing less.
Using a few mathematical techniques, we can obtain similarity scores for players based on style-based metrics, such as propensity to carry and progressive pass receptions. When we look at the top ten most similar players from across Europe’s top five leagues, we can see a few potential alternatives to Mbeumo.
Badredine Bouanani represents a younger and cheaper option, valued at £6 million. However, with the Nice player’s in possession numbers not being quite up to scratch yet and United wanting ready made players, Bouanani wouldn’t have been the correct signing to make.
Takefusa Kubo, on the other hand, has shown incredible ball progression numbers for Sociedad. Being linked to Bayern Munich is a sign of a quality player, and being valued at £26 million with a release clause of £52 million would have made Kubo a very attractive proposition for cost-cutting United.
United have made it apparent that their focus is on Premier League proven players that can add immediate quality to the first team squad. This means that realistically, Kubo wouldn’t have been a prospect for this summer. So, we need to restrict our search to Premier League players.
Restricting the search this way gives us some interesting results. Matheus Cunha comes in as the 4th most similar player to Mbeumo in the Premier League. We also see Omari Hutchinson, who has been picked out by Brentford as Mbeumo’s replacement, as the youngest player on the shortlist.
Justin Kluivert is a player who has been linked with a move to Manchester in recent months and comes with a market value of £30 million, however, with Bournemouth losing Dean Huijsen and Milos Kerkez already this summer, that number is likely to have been much higher.
The name that stands out on this list is Eze. A player linked to Arsenal currently, Eze provides a lot of creativity through his dangerous passing. He’s great in the counter, as shown during the FA Cup final against Manchester City, which would be an asset to a very transitional Manchester United team. He’s versatile, playing in the centre of the pitch as well as in wider positions, and has played in back 4 and back 3 systems as recently as this season under Oliver Glasner.
However, I don’t think this signing would be correct for United either. Eze’s progression largely comes from passing and not carrying – something that makes him more like Matheus Cunha rather than Mbeumo. On top of that, Eze’s current market value is £48 million – the same as Mbeumo’s value during this period. Current rumours suggest that a potential move to Arsenal would cost between £60-70 million – again, the same as Mbeumo.
Eze would likely have been a good backup option if Brentford were to further increase their asking price for Mbeumo. Kubo would have been a great alternative if United wanted to take the risk of signing a player from outside the Premier League. However, in this current market, no other player provides a better option than Bryan Mbeumo.
This was a signing that United had to make, even if it meant overpaying very slightly. Getting the deal done before the team’s US preseason tour allows both Mbeumo and Cunha to settle into the squad. As far as Manchester United transfers have gone over the past few years, this is one of the better ones – and well, £70 million total on Mbeumo looks a lot better than £70 million on Rasmus Hojlund right now…