Millwall FC put a £9m price-tag on star, but he left on a free - was this a mistake? | OneFootball

Jed Wallace is a modern day Millwall great, but the club never received a fee for him

Success has been fairly hard to come by for Millwall supporters of late, with a raft of near-misses in the Championship play-off race weighing heavy, but it's not all been doom and gloom.

Millwall fans will be quick to point out that success is relative, and for a side whose budget is considerably smaller than most of the clubs they've competed against down the years, simply to be pushing at the top end of the table is success in itself.

Without the riches or parachute payments their rivals had, Millwall have had to be smart with their recruitment, mainly looking at loans and free transfers as a source of value, with the odd fee thrown in here and there.

Some of the players they've signed for fees have been successful, with Zian Flemming being a primary example, but others like Kevin Nisbet are a stark reminder that money doesn't necessarily buy success in the Championship.

It was a small fee deal in 2017 which brought around arguably the best transfer Millwall have pulled off in years too, when a 2017 double deal brought George Saville and Jed Wallace to the club.

Jed Wallace was sensational for Millwall

It wouldn't be unreasonable to refer to Wallace as a modern-day great for Millwall, such was his impact on the team over a prolonged period of time, but it will always leave a bitter taste that they were never able to get into the play-offs in spite of his impact.

Wallace moved to The Den on a permanent deal in 2017 after impressing on loan as Millwall were promoted out of League One in 2016/17, but few would've predicted the impact he would go on to make in the second tier.

Across five Championship seasons with Millwall, Wallace was consistently among their leading goal contributors, and was key in not only keeping the Lions in the Championship, but also ensuring they were pushing the top six.

Millwall gained a reputation of being the league's 'nearly men' as they just couldn't get over the line in the play-off race, but that certainly wasn't down to Wallace, who in his last three seasons with the club, contributed to at least 16 goals in each campaign.

His best-ever Championship campaign came in 2019/20 when he amassed an incredible 22 goal contributions as Millwall missed out on the play-offs by two points.

Jed Wallace leaving for free will have left a bitter taste

Wallace swapped The Den for The Hawthorns in 2022, moving to the Midlands on a free transfer after he ran down his Millwall contract, and that will certainly leave a bitter taste for the club.

Despite having one of the best players in the Championship over a number of years, the Lions were unable to turn any profit on him despite slapping a £9m fee on his head six months before his departure.

Wallace leaving for free essentially means Millwall turned a loss on him given they had to invest to bring him to South London in 2017, which means from a business standpoint, his transfer will always sting.

It would be a very different conversation if they'd have held onto him and he'd fired them into the Premier League, but ultimately that didn't happen, and they turned in a loss across his five-year stay.

The South Londoners will always look back tinged with regret, wondering whether they'd have been better off cashing in on the £1.5m+ offer Nottingham Forest made in the window before he departed for free.