Best and the Rest of City Business

With deadline day looming, we look at each top-flight London club’s best and worst dallies into the transfer market since the inaugural 1992-93 Premier League season:

Chelsea

BEST: Didier Drogba – The 26-year-old came with a hefty, then-club record £24m price tag that some thought he would be unable to repay. But Jose Mourinho and the Blues board reaped the rewards of the Ivorian’s workrate, leadership skills and pure class in spearheading the attack, giving rise to some of the most dominant displays ever seen on these shores and culminating with a Champions League-clinching sign-off.

WORST: Andriy Shevchenko – Having this time smashed the English transfer record for another star striker, Chelsea never quite coaxed the show-stopper out of a £30m-plus, 30-year-old, one-time Ballon D’Or winner that had seemingly seen better days by the time he got to Stamford Bridge. On the other hand, it did seem to bring the best out of Drogba. Plus, Fernando Torres could still edge him for this ignominious honour, once we are able to look back on the Spaniard’s entire time in West London and compare profligacies.

Arsenal

BEST: Thierry Henry –What to say about a player often lauded as the greatest this country has seen? His £11m purchase now seems like a bargain of epic proportions, as the Frenchman brought a touch of the footballing Bourgeoisie to Highbury. Goals in abundance, assists by the barrel and countless moments of intermittently sprinkled magic were gifted to us all as Henry cemented his place in the annals of the modern game.

WORST: Andrey Arshavin – Still the Gunners’ record buy and despite a furious start in red and white, the Russian made few friends in North London with his lacklustre displays and controversial views on women. Having spent the last season on loan in his homeland with Zenit St Petersburg, the former Russian Footballer of the Year finally made the move permanent in the summer and his farewell will have brought no tears in N5.

Tottenham Hotspur

BEST: Gareth Bale – If re-sale value is taken into account, there can really be no argument. The soon-to-be World Record Real Madrid signing has come on in leaps and bounds since joining Spurs from Southampton for an eventual £10m in 2007 and has been voted PFA Player of the Year in two of the last three seasons. Now, he is on the cusp of becoming the world’s most expensive player and, even for such a commanding fee in return, few at the Lane will be ready to see the powerful, jinking runs and blockbuster strikes, which lit up the English top-flight, leave for sunnier climes.

WORST: David Bentley – At £15m, and with £7m of that reportedly going to deadly rivals Arsenal, for whom he had represented their youth side, this has to represent the worst example of market-manoeuvrings in Spurs’ recent history. Marred by injury and under-performance, the wide midfielder’s five-year spell managed to take in four separate loan terms, including one at Russia’s FC Rostov, in the search for willing wage-payers, until Tottenham were mercifully put out of their misery by the winding-down of the now-28-year-old’s contract.

West Ham United

BEST: Paolo Di Canio – Four years at Upton Park saw the flamboyant Italian restore his reputation, overcoming previous difficulties with officials by halting play due to opposition injury and gaining widespread praise for his sportsmanship. More importantly, he was a constant menace at the business end of the Hammers’ attack, leading his side to a famous FA cup 4^th Round win at Old Trafford in 2001 and claiming the 2000 Goal of the Season with a delicious volley against Wimbledon.

WORST: Benni McCarthy – Overweight on arrival, injured within a matter of weeks and eventually paid over one-and-a-half million big ones just to leave the Boleyn Ground, this 12-month sojourn will not be a happy memory for any of the parties concerned. Having signed from Blackburn Rovers in 2010 as a former Champions League winner with FC Porto, the South African was last seen turning out for his native Orlando Pirates before announcing his retirement in the summer.

Fulham

BEST: Brede Hangeland – The towering Norwegian centre-back has been a colossus at the heart of the Lilywhites’ backline ever since arriving from FC Kobenhavn for a cut-price £2.5m in January 2008. He made an instant impact down by the Thames, helping the Cottagers avoid relegation in his first season and heroically leading from the back of Roy Hodgson’s miserly side that negotiated a marathon UEFA Europa League campaign and reached the club’s first ever European final in 2010.

WORST: Steve Marlet – For eleven-and-a-half million of the worst pounds ever spent, Jean Tiguana was responsible for bringing this goal-shorn striker to Craven Cottage in one of his last significant acts as manager. The still-standing club record fee left Olympique Lyonnais laughing in 2001 and two years and 11 goals later he was loaned to Olympique Marseille for 18 months and not invited back, his contract being officially cancelled in 2005.

Crystal Palace

BEST: Julian Speroni – Bought in 2004 from Dundee, the Argentinian has surpassed his pyjama-clad predecessor, Gabor Kiraly, and then some. Although never recognised by his country and now entering his 35^th year, Speroni is the first ever player to be awarded the Eagles’ Player of the Year trophy three years in succession and is currently the backbone on which Palace’s Premier League hopes rest.

WORST: Michele Padovano – Mark Goldberg and Attilio Lombardo - the strategical Dream Team - enticed the former Champions League winner from his time at Juventus for what was, at that time, a sizeable fee for the club. The £1.7m never appeared to have been money well-allocated, however, and, having lasted a single year in which he played just once, the under-firing frontman was sold to French club Metz at a huge loss, before returning to sue the directors for loss of wages a year later. Although, it is probably fair to say that player and club’s fortunes have rather differed of late, with Palace back in the big time and the Italian currently serving an 8-year and 8-month sentence for drug trafficking!