The staggering cost of Phil Jones' 10 injury-ravaged seasons at Man Utd
FT Desk
- 3 Feb 2022 14:55 CST
- 5 min read
A rather strange and not altogether common thing happened at Old Trafford at the start of the year that perhaps caught Manchester United fans by surprise.
As fans began to congregate for the club’s Premier League clash with Wolves, they took to social media or picked up a match programme to find something of a surprise: Phil Jones was in the starting XI.
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Once considered a bright and talented English defender, Jones’ career has unfortunately been struck down by one injury after another.
Indeed, his inclusion in Ralf Rangnick’s squad on January 3 was his first Premier League appearance in almost two years, when he faced Burnley in January 2020.
As such, while Jones is certainly not at fault for his misfortune, his time at Old Trafford has been little short of a disaster and undoubtedly a costly one for the club.
The financial cost of Jones’ Man Utd career
Since making the move to Man Utd in 2011 for a fee of £17.4 million, Jones has missed a massive 205 games through injury over the course of the last 10 seasons with the club.
As such, Jones has only made 225 appearances for the Old Trafford side and amassed 17,281 minutes of game time over the past 10 seasons. Indeed, when we consider how many games he’s been out injured, Jones has actually missed more game time than he has actually played in for Man Utd since joining the club.
According to the player’s reported salary over the course of his three contracts with the club, plus his initial transfer fee, Jones has cost no less than £54.5m to Man Utd over the past 10 seasons.
When we break that down into cost per appearance, it works out at £242,222 per game and a rather staggering £283,838 per 90 minutes over the course of his Man Utd career. Which may make him the most expensive player in the club’s history, based on how much football he actually plays.
