Wayne Bridge discloses that he never thought he was the kind of player for whom someone would be willing to spend an amount that Manchester City spent in the summer of 2009.
Twelve million Pounds was the transfer fee which got Bridge transferred from the Stamford Bridge to the Etihad Stadium and the defender was completely shocked when he came to know about it first up.
Bridge recalls a chat that he had regarding that massive fee with his mate and an ex-England player Jamie Redknapp during which he remembers telling him that the fee was way more than he deserved.
However, Redknapp didn’t agree to that. He thought Bridge had enough ability in him to warrant that kind of a transfer fee, but Bridge himself was not convinced at all that the amount was suitable for him.
As per Bridge, when he had started playing Football, he had never thought there would be a day when the defenders were going to be bought for prices in excess of fifty million Pounds, but today it’s happening quite frequently.
It’s increasing every day and nobody knows what the limit is as far as the transfer fees and the salaries of the players are concerned. It’s absolutely astonishing how much of money has come into the game and how much of money a Footballer can make throughout his career.
Talking about his tenure at Chelsea, Bridge says that the pressure at Chelsea was not immense unlike City because Chelsea had not spent an extraordinary amount to buy him. There were quite a few players in that Chelsea squad who had come at that sort of transfer fee. So people were not keeping a keen eye on him and that way, he felt really comfortable.