Oliver Skipp Confirmed

[JimJams]

In the modern era he's in competition with Daka, Soumare, Vesty, Faes, WARD, Adrien Silva, Benkovic and maybe a few more. 

[StanSP]

17 minutes ago, Donwebbio said:

Still comfortably in the top 5 worst signings in our modern era

Comfortably??

 

Ward

Daka

Soumare

Bertrand

Ghezzal

Kapustka

Golding

Benkovic

 

 

I wouldn't call myself Skipp's biggest fan at all, but there's no way he's in 'top 5 worst signings' in modern era. Also depends what you mean by modern era as well - 10 years? Less?

[honeybradger]

Does Benkovic really count as that bad of a signing when he looked very good for Celtic before his injury and he just kept getting injured from there. He wasnt injury prone before that injury if I remember correctly so we couldnt have known.

 

I dont think Ricardo Pereira's injury history lessens how good of a signging he was for example, just unfortunate circumstances.

[Donwebbio]

8 minutes ago, StanSP said:

Comfortably??

 

Ward

Daka

Soumare

Bertrand

Ghezzal

Kapustka

Golding

Benkovic

 

 

I wouldn't call myself Skipp's biggest fan at all, but there's no way he's in 'top 5 worst signings' in modern era. Also depends what you mean by modern era as well - 10 years? Less?

Lets say King Power era. As a newly promoted club, Skipp was our statement signing - along with Bilal. A big chunk of our budget went on him and he wasn't good enough to start games. We got relegated. That makes him a bad signing. When you add in the 5 year of financial commitment which has contributed to PSR breaches, it is not comparable in any way to the bottom 5 names on hour list. The top 3 absolutely are/were terrible signings.

[AKCJ]

24 minutes ago, StanSP said:

Comfortably??

 

Ward

Daka

Soumare

Bertrand

Ghezzal

Kapustka

Golding

Benkovic

 

 

I wouldn't call myself Skipp's biggest fan at all, but there's no way he's in 'top 5 worst signings' in modern era. Also depends what you mean by modern era as well - 10 years? Less?

I think you need to factor in that we paid £25m at a time where money was extremely tight.

 

The Skipp signing is pretty much the difference between failing PSR or getting through by the skin of our teeth.

 

We've seen nothing to suggest that he's been worth that. The others on that list were all just as bad or worse than him in terms of ability but were bought from a position of relative comfort and we had squads that could mask their ability a bit more.

 

Loving his revival but it's only been 3/4 games. We need to see him have a full season of this form to say he's worth £25m.

[Stadt]

Skipp in some senses is the worst signing because he wasn't worth half of that amount. Nobody else would have came close to paying what we did, we spent essentially double his market value voluntarily - there was no bidding war or mitigating circumstances. Ward is the only running him close on that metric however he's by far the worst player we've signed relative to the level we were at.

 

Soumare is shit, Daka hasn't worked out, Slimani was illogical given we had Vardy as the first choice ST etc but we paid close to the market value for all of those. Skipp has just never been a £20-25m player.

 

 

 

 

 

[StanSP]

1 hour ago, AKCJ said:

I think you need to factor in that we paid £25m at a time where money was extremely tight.

 

The Skipp signing is pretty much the difference between failing PSR or getting through by the skin of our teeth.

 

We've seen nothing to suggest that he's been worth that. The others on that list were all just as bad or worse than him in terms of ability but were bought from a position of relative comfort and we had squads that could mask their ability a bit more.

 

Loving his revival but it's only been 3/4 games. We need to see him have a full season of this form to say he's worth £25m.

I do see that viewpoint, honestly. But stacked up against other signings in the past 15 or so years, he's not in the top 5 for me. And definitely not comfortably! 

 

Agree we need to see more of him and more of what he's done in the past few weeks. 

 

[JimJams]

1 hour ago, honeybradger said:

Does Benkovic really count as that bad of a signing when he looked very good for Celtic before his injury and he just kept getting injured from there. He wasnt injury prone before that injury if I remember correctly so we couldnt have known.

 

I dont think Ricardo Pereira's injury history lessens how good of a signging he was for example, just unfortunate circumstances.

Benko cost about 12million quid and never played a league game for us and left for nothing. 

Basically money for nothing. 

 

If he wasn't a bad signing neither was Bertrand.

[Donwebbio]

King Power/Top/Rudkin have missed a once in a generation chance to establish us as a top 6 team by squandering millions and millions on shite and then paying  them well over market value in wages. This financial mismanagement has ended up with the club being handicapped operationally and with an incoming points deduction. Some fans think we should be chill about it though.

 

[honeybradger]

21 minutes ago, JimJams said:

Benko cost about 12million quid and never played a league game for us and left for nothing. 

Basically money for nothing. 

 

If he wasn't a bad signing neither was Bertrand.

Bertrand had lost his legs though, even when he played he was bad. The transfer didn't make sense before his injury.

 

With Benkovic at least he was showing promise and was getting compared to Van Dijk at Celtic before his injury. When Gvardiol transferred from Zagreb I remember seeing a Zagreb fan likening him to Benkovic and Gvardiol turned out to be a £90mil player.

 

If we made more transfers like Benkovic from leagues like the Croatian one I am sure it would pay dividends more often than not.

Edited 18 December 2025 by honeybradger

[LCFCJohn]

Too early to be throwing labels like top 5 worst etc about. 
 

We all know we overpaid. We know until recent weeks he hasn’t done much. However, recently, with Winks out the picture, he hasn’t been looking very good alongside James.

 

All hypothetical but let’s say he is integral in the remainder of this season and we ended up in the playoffs and won them. Straight away, whilst the transfer fee is still a big issue, he will have contributed strongly. Then it’s what happens after that.

 

Or he might return to being crap, we finish bottom half of the Championship and go on a 2004-2008 type era and yes, he is considered in that bracket.

 

Point being, we have had a number of signings who have contributed nothing for significant fees. Soumare, Daka, Silva come to mind. Slimani cost a lot but at least got a few goals in the CL. Ward was so so costly. Faes I would put as a worse signing. Not to mention some of the others in the list above that yes, didn’t cost as much (Ghezzal, Benkovic, Kapuska) but didn’t contribute anything to us. And if we are criticising the timing of the Skipp transfer, being newly promoted, what about the timing of a number of these mentioned above when we were in a strong position and pissed it away.

[ALC Fox]

I can see Skipp being a real asset in the Championship. He seems to be settling down and finding a role now.

 

The Premier League is a different matter but in all likelihood we won't be competing in that division for at least another season after this one. If we do manage to go up this season, then I suspect he'll have played a major part and we'll get to find out how Marti sets up and a confident Skipp performs in the top division.

[Stadt]

2 hours ago, JimJams said:

Benko cost about 12million quid and never played a league game for us and left for nothing. 

Basically money for nothing. 

 

If he wasn't a bad signing neither was Bertrand.

You have to try and separate the process and outcome. Benkovic was good process/bad outcome. Right age, good profile, looked talented and not overly expensive.

 

Kapustka was a far worse signing (who also left on a free)

Edited 18 December 2025 by Stadt

[CosbehFox]

Just add as well Benkovic on FFP wasn’t a ball breaker 

[filbertway]

2 hours ago, JimJams said:

Benko cost about 12million quid and never played a league game for us and left for nothing. 

Basically money for nothing. 

 

If he wasn't a bad signing neither was Bertrand.

You're kind of.missing the point that injury did him in when he was getting comparison to Van Dijk from Celtic fans before his injury.

 

I'd describe it unfortunate rather than poor. 

 

Bertrand coming in on 80 bags a week when he was part of Rodger's son's agency absolutely stank

 

[AKCJ]

2 hours ago, StanSP said:

I do see that viewpoint, honestly. But stacked up against other signings in the past 15 or so years, he's not in the top 5 for me. And definitely not comfortably! 

 

Agree we need to see more of him and more of what he's done in the past few weeks. 

 

I don't think anyone would argue against Skipp being a top 5 worst signing if you asked a month ago.

 

Does that all change from a months worth of football? For me, no chance. He needs to prove himself.

[HighPeakFox]

2 hours ago, Donwebbio said:

King Power/Top/Rudkin have missed a once in a generation chance to establish us as a top 6 team by squandering millions and millions on shite and then paying  them well over market value in wages. This financial mismanagement has ended up with the club being handicapped operationally and with an incoming points deduction. Some fans think we should be chill about it though.

 

Although a lot of this is true, we were never ever going to be an established top 6 club. The whole game is largely a cartel, designed to keep most teams in their place. 

[LCFCJohn]

There’s plenty of places to rightly slate KP for their destruction of the club.

 

I am one of their biggest critics. However, this is a player thread. And one who looks to be improving and gaining confidence. It feels like the need to post about him being in the top 5 worst signings, causing a debate about worst signings is just looking for negativity for negativity’s sake.

 

We all think we overpaid for Skipp. But he is an honest and hard working, quite likeable player who is now showing some good ability at this level at least. Like it or not, he is under contract until 2029. We need him to keep up and build on this form further in our own interests. Whether this is that he helps us back to the PL or even a financially beneficial sale down the line. So we are better off getting behind him rather than bringing negativity back into it when the conversation around Skipp has been becoming more positive. 

[honeybradger]

5 hours ago, AKCJ said:

I think you need to factor in that we paid £25m at a time where money was extremely tight.

 

The Skipp signing is pretty much the difference between failing PSR or getting through by the skin of our teeth.

 

We've seen nothing to suggest that he's been worth that. The others on that list were all just as bad or worse than him in terms of ability but were bought from a position of relative comfort and we had squads that could mask their ability a bit more.

 

Loving his revival but it's only been 3/4 games. We need to see him have a full season of this form to say he's worth £25m.

Even a full season at the level he is at is not enough to make him worth £25mil.

 

Dewsbury Hall went for £30mil after playing far better than Skipp has the last 3 games and we said that was fair. Wharton went for £20mil after a performing well in the championship and he is far more talented than Skipp.

 

A full season of the most recent performances and Skipp is probably worth £15mil and even then we would probably count ourselves lucky if it went through.

[Mark 'expert' Lawrenson]

4 hours ago, StanSP said:

I do see that viewpoint, honestly. But stacked up against other signings in the past 15 or so years, he's not in the top 5 for me. And definitely not comfortably! 

 

Agree we need to see more of him and more of what he's done in the past few weeks. 

 

He has the opportunity to get himself out of the list (if he deserves to be in it is a matter of opinion) I hope he goes on to be a good servant to the club 

[Tommy Fresh]

9 hours ago, Stadt said:

You have to try and separate the process and outcome. Benkovic was good process/bad outcome. Right age, good profile, looked talented and not overly expensive.

 

Kapustka was a far worse signing (who also left on a free)

Kapustka like Benkovic was the right sort of profile, fairly cheap and likely on low wages and if they develop, you comfortably make decent money on them

[Stadt]

8 hours ago, Tommy Fresh said:

Kapustka like Benkovic was the right sort of profile, fairly cheap and likely on low wages and if they develop, you comfortably make decent money on them

He was signed in the back of a tournament performance, a recruitment cardinal sin. He was also shit. Benkovic was scouted properly.

[murphy]

23 hours ago, StanSP said:

Comfortably??

 

Ward

Daka

Soumare

Bertrand

Ghezzal

Kapustka

Golding

Benkovic

 

 

I wouldn't call myself Skipp's biggest fan at all, but there's no way he's in 'top 5 worst signings' in modern era. Also depends what you mean by modern era as well - 10 years? Less?

Faes, Vestergaard, Kristiansen, Souttar, Okoli, Ayew, Coady....

 

 

Edited 19 December 2025 by murphy

[adhart]

Slimani

[Blue.Fox84]

I’m not having that Skipp is the worst or top 5 worst signings we’ve made 🤣

 

Unfortunately he comes with the price tag, which is nothing to do with him. That’s on us and our poor control of finances, we all know he isn’t worth that amount of money but for some reason we decided to pay it, also at a time when money was tight

 

He’s limited to what he can do but I think he makes an impact, he’s versatile and seems to have remained professional. 
 

There’s players in this current side who cant play, can’t run or quite simply CBA that I’d be pointing the finger at first for being labelled as a worst signing no matter how cheap or expensive of a signing they were 🤷‍♂️