A precocious talent at Everton, Man United won the race for an 18-year-old Rooney in the summer of 2004. He cost £25.6m, and even Sir Alex Ferguson admitted ‘there were plenty of eyebrows raised’ when he made the decision to offer such a fee for a teenager. But Rooney paid it back, and then some. He left Old Trafford in 2017 as the club’s record scorer and with 12 major honours to his name.
After scoring 42 goals in just 46 games for PSV, Barca signed a 19-year-old Ronaldo for around £13.