10 Footballers Who Returned To Their Former Clubs For Inflated Prices

2. Nicolas Anelka - Paris Saint-Germain

Perhaps the best example of a player returning to a former club for a grossly-inflated price is Nicolas Anelka. Anelka is the quintessential journeyman of football, playing for no fewer than 12 different clubs throughout his career. The former Arsenal, Manchester City and Chelsea star never stuck around at any one club for long, and ended up costing Paris Saint-Germain a pretty penny in 2000. Anelka began his career with PSG as a member of their youth academy and broke into the French club's senior side in 1996. He struggled, however, scoring once in 10 games. Nevertheless, Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger clearly saw something nobody else did because he brought him to Highbury in 1997 when PSG sold up for a minuscule £500,000. After leaving Arsenal for Real Madrid in 1999, PSG were starting to realise they had made a mistake and brought him back to the Parc des Princes for £22 MILLION. Was it worth it? No, is the short answer. Within two years of returning to PSG for £21-and-a-half-million more than what the French club sold him for, he fell out with first team coach Luis Fernandez, was loaned to Liverpool and finally sold to City for £13 million. Ouch.