Elliot Anderson's £116m transfer from Nottingham Forest to Manchester City makes him the third-most expensive signing in Premier League history — behind only Alexander Isak and Florian Wirtz. Yet new research adjusting historic fees for the dramatic growth in football revenues tells a very different story.

According to the Laws-Maguire Index, developed by football finance expert Kieran Maguire and professor Jason Laws, Anderson is in fact only the 31st-most expensive Premier League signing of all time when fees are recalculated to reflect what clubs could actually afford to spend at the time.

Why inflation alone doesn't tell the whole story

Most historical fee comparisons rely on standard inflation measures — but the price of groceries has little bearing on a football transfer market transformed by a 3,500 per cent surge in Premier League revenues over three decades. The Laws-Maguire Index accounts for that revenue growth to produce a far more meaningful comparison.

The results are striking. Isak, whose £125m fee is the highest ever paid in the Premier League in nominal terms, drops all the way to 14th in the adjusted rankings.

Shearer leads the all-time list

Alan Shearer tops the Laws-Maguire Index. Newcastle paid Blackburn Rovers £15m for the striker in 1996 — a figure that sounds modest today but, adjusted for the revenue landscape of the time, equates to a staggering £237m in modern terms.

Two early-2000s Manchester United signings occupy second and third place. Rio Ferdinand's £33m arrival from Leeds United in 2003 adjusts to £179m, while Juan Sebastian Veron's £28m move in 2001 recalculates to £199m — placing Veron above Ferdinand despite the smaller nominal fee.

Stan Collymore is fourth. His £9m switch from Nottingham Forest to Liverpool in 1995 translates to £179m today. Fernando Torres completes the top five; his £50m departure from Liverpool to Chelsea in 2011 would be valued at £177m under the Index.

Manchester United dominate the top 10

Dennis Bergkamp, Andy Cole, Andriy Shevchenko, Dwight Yorke, and Paul Pogba round out the top 10, meaning five of the ten costliest signings in adjusted terms are Manchester United players.

Ferdinand appears twice in the top 15. His earlier £18m move from West Ham United to Leeds United in 2001 — two years before his Old Trafford switch — is calculated at £140m in today's money.

Among current Premier League players, only Isak, Jack Grealish, Moises Caicedo, and Enzo Fernandez feature in the top 20 of the adjusted list.

The Laws-Maguire Index ultimately suggests that, for all the eye-catching fees of the modern era, clubs in the Premier League's formative years were spending at least as extravagantly relative to their resources — and in several cases, far more so.