20 Premier League flops who were incredible outside of England, ft Di Maria and Gnabry | OneFootball

Highlights

'Yeah he's good, but can he do it in the Premier League?'

It's a line we hear all too often and a benchmark that is, truthfully, rather skewed in deciding just how good a footballer really is.

Many players are signed for big fees, or rise up through a club’s academy, only to then be sold after failing to impress in English football’s top-flight.

But while a brief moment in the Premier League spotlight is all some are remembered for, others then depart and make their mark for a club abroad, leaving onlookers scratching their heads as to where that was in the years previous.

Surprisingly, that happens a lot more than you might think. So the team at GIVEMESPORT thought we would put together a list of 20 players who did not earn their flowers in the Premier League but did elsewhere.

20 Joselu

Newcastle and Stoke City fans will remember the Spaniard all too well, with the striker looking lacklustre for both clubs in the Premier League.

He would score just 10 times in the top-flight for both teams but scored 16 goals for Espanyol in La Liga last season.

He now finds himself at Real Madrid and scored a spectacular bicycle kick against Manchester United in pre-season.

19 Alexander Sorloth

Crystal Palace parted with some £9 million to sign Sorloth in January 2018, and he very quickly looked like a fish out of water, not scoring his first goal for the club until August that year.

His time at multiple clubs since leaving Palace on loan in 2019 has included 24 goals for Trabzonspor in the 2019/20 Super Lig season, and most recently 12 goals for Real Sociedad in the 2022/23 La Liga campaign.

18 Paulinho

Tottenham signed the Brazilian midfielder in 2013, but he never looked at home at White Hart Lane. He was sold to Guangzhou FC just two years later.

He would impress while in China, so much so that Barcelona then decided to sign him in 2017. He played 49 games for the Catalan side and won the league title in the 2017/18 campaign.

17 Cristhian Stuani

Middlesbrough fans might be surprised to see a man who scored just four goals in 23 Premier League appearances on this list.

But after joining Girona in 2017, the Uruguayan went from strength to strength.

Stuani netted 21 times in La Liga during his first season at the club and kept up that impressive rate by scoring 19 the following campaign.

Boro fans must be reading that and wondering what on earth happened when he was contracted to them.

16 Suso

Things just did not go according to plan for the winger at Liverpool. After a loan to Almeria, he was then sold to AC Milan, making just 14 Premier League appearances for the Reds.

His fortunes would change in Italy though, and Suso would become a regular starter for the Rossoneri.

He’s been at Sevilla since 2020 and has picked up two Europa League trophies during his stay in Spain.

15 Sebastien Haller

He might have scored 33 goals for Eintracht Frankfurt, but Haller struggled after signing for West Ham in 2019.

The striker was sold to Ajax in January 2021 and rediscovered his goalscoring touch, finding the back of the net 47 times in 66 games.

He now finds himself at Borussia Dortmund.

14 Alvaro Morata

Chelsea fans remember the Spaniard’s glaring misses all too well. It’s fair to say that no fan in west London misses him.

Given how much Morata has moved around since leaving Chelsea, it is hard to say he’s shone elsewhere, but he has gone on to lead the line effectively for both Atletico Madrid and Juventus.

His most recent season with Atleti saw him net 13 La Liga goals.

13 Moise Kean

Another striker who flopped in England and had more success at Juventus.

Kean scored just two league goals from 32 matches for Everton, and after a loan to PSG in 2020 where he scored 17 times, he moved to Italy in 2021.

He joined the club permanently this summer, having found the back of the net 14 times since joining on loan in 2021.

12 Iago Aspas

Remembered most famously by Liverpool fans for taking the corner against Chelsea that led to a goal in a game that cost them the 2013/14 Premier League, Aspas' stock very quickly hit rock bottom in England.

Since leaving and returning to La Liga in 2015, though, the tricky Spaniard has built a fine career for himself.

Aspas is Celta Vigo's all-time top scorer and managed to bag 100 La Liga goals from 209 games; only four players since the Spanish Civil War achieved the feat quicker than him.

11 Henrikh Mkhitaryan

It might be harsh to name Mkhitaryan a flop for his time at Manchester United and Arsenal. But seeing as he said he had to leave the Gunners to "get pleasure playing football again,” we’re putting him on this list.

Having joined Roma and then Inter, the Armenian has certainly rediscovered his passion for the game in Italy, lifting an Italian Cup and a Europa Conference League in the process.

10 Chris Smalling

Smalling represented Manchester United for 10 years and won the Premier League among other honours, so labelling him a flop is cruel.

But the club clearly did not believe he was the man to lead them forward, loaning him to Roma in 2019 before selling him permanently to the Italian side the following year.

Smalling has gone on to be a key player for the Serie A team. He looks much more assured in Italy and won the Europa Conference League with Jose Mourinho at the helm.

9 Radamel Falcao

He might have been outstanding for Atletico Madrid, but Falcao was terrible for two different clubs in the Premier League.

Manchester United and Chelsea fans will both tell you that the loans were just not worth it, with the striker managing just five league goals in total for both clubs.

What followed though was a return of the Falcao of old at Monaco, as the forward fired in goals and helped crown his side Ligue 1 champions in 16/17.

8 Juan Cuadrado

Signing for Chelsea in January 2015 off the back of an extraordinary display at the 2014 World Cup with Colombia, Cuadrado never seemed to get going in England and was shipped away before he could find a groove.

He was back in Serie A after half a season at Stamford Bridge, this time with Juventus, and immediately looked a world-beater once again.

The move became permanent in 2017, and the wing-back would go on to win five Scudetti.

7 Memphis Depay

The hype was real when Depay signed for United ahead of the 2015/16 season. However, the hype very quickly died out when too much was expected of the Dutchman, who was still just a youngster at the time.

An ill-fated 18 months in Manchester ended in 2017 with Depay moving to Lyon. It was there, though, that we saw exactly what it was that United were expecting to get out of him.

The winger looked fantastic, scoring goals for fun. He went on to join Barcelona in 2021, and now plys his trade for Atletico Madrid.

6 Jerome Boateng

Boateng spent just one season with Manchester City following his 2010 transfer from Hamburg, where it became very quickly apparent that he wasn't ready for the English top flight.

The opportunity to move to Bayern Munich arose the following summer and the German defender got his wish.

He became one of the best defenders in the world and was integral to Bayern's domestic dominance, winning two Champions Leagues during an incredible tenure, and lifting the World Cup with Germany in 2014.

5 Diego Forlan

Forlan earned cult hero status among Manchester United fans when he bagged a quickfire brace at Anfield to ensure United beat Liverpool in 2002, but his spell was otherwise underwhelming.

He left Old Trafford in 2004 and rebuilt his reputation from there, firstly with Villarreal, but most famously with Atletico Madrid, where he unlocked truly world-class levels and scored the winner in the 2010 Europa League final.

4 Mohamed Salah

It is strange putting Salah on a Premier League flop list, but his time at Chelsea certainly falls into that category.

The Egypt international was loaned to Fiorentina just 12 months after joining the Blues in 2015.

He then signed for Roma permanently in 2016 after an initial loan, and he rediscovered his best form there, scoring 34 times for the Serie A side.

And to rub even more salt into the wounds of Chelsea fans, Salah then returned to the Premier League to clear his ‘flop’ status by shining at Liverpool.

3 Angel Di Maria

Given what Di Maria accomplished at Real Madrid, he should have been incredible for United. But just 12 months after signing, he left the club permanently for PSG.

Widely regarded as one of the worst United transfers of the modern era, he then tore it up for the Ligue 1 side, scoring 93 goals and lifting five league titles.

2 Serge Gnabry

Everyone remembers Tony Pulis’ infamous statement where he said the German winger was not at a high enough level to play for the Baggies.

But boy has Gnabry made him eat his words since then.

He returned to Germany with Werder Bremen in 2016 and was then snapped up by Bayern Munich.

Now, Gnabry is a mainstay in Bayern's first team, lifting a Champions League and weighing in with 132 goal contributions since his arrival.

1 Gerard Pique

Sir Alex Ferguson rarely got a transfer wrong at Manchester United, but he had a howler with Pique.

Admittedly, he would have done well to displace Nemanja Vidic or Rio Ferdinand in the starting lineup.

Wayne Rooney later recalled that after the Spaniard was “bullied” at Bolton, Ferguson decided he wasn’t right for the league.

But he was perfect for La Liga and Barcelona. Under Pep Guardiola, Pique would develop into one of the best defenders in world football, lifting multiple league titles with his club, as well as a World Cup and European Championship with Spain.