On Wednesday night, Ajax and Rangers both suffered heavy defeats in the Champions League, with Calvin Bassey finding himself in the spotlight.
The Nigeria international was making his fourth appearance in the Champions League as Napoli recorded a 4-2 win in Naples, just days after beating Ajax 6-1 in Amsterdam.
While Rangers may have suffered humiliation themselves with a 7-1 defeat to Liverpool, analyst René van der Gijp believes the Scottish giants have got the better of Ajax in the market.
Ajax overpaid Rangers for Calvin Bassey
According to Van der Gijp, Ajax paid far too much for Bassey.
The reigning Eredivisie champions parted with £19.6m to sign the 22-year-old, in a deal which could still rise to £22.7m with add-ons.
As quoted by Voetbal Primeur, Van der Gijp said: “If you spend €24m for Bassey, you must have seen him all year, right? €24m, how high do you set the bar? That Napoli midfielder who comes from Fulham (André-Frank Zambo Anguissa), a great player, much better than Álvarez and Sangaré, you can already see that after a quarter of an hour.
“€5m for Conceição, fine, but €24m for Bassey…”
Clearly, the Dutch analyst doesn’t think much of the Nigerian.
Calvin Bassey deserves patience after leaving Rangers
In our view, Van der Gijp has been quite hard on Bassey.
The Italy-born defender is just 12 games into the season in a new country, one he has never played his football in before.
At the age of just 22, Bassey deserves patience as he settles into life at Ajax, where most of his teammates are also underperforming, not just him.
In truth, he hasn’t even been that bad.
Of course, the fee was a significant one for an Eredivisie outfit, but Bassey has still managed to score one goal and provide three assists in his 12 appearances so far.
In time, Ajax will surely start to get value for their investment.
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