[G Richards]

This is not an exact science, but I would imagine that we would be tempted to put too high of a valuation on Barnes and Beardsley, given we know what they went on to do in their Liverpool careers. At the time of signing, Beardsley (if memory serves me well) was a 'sure thing' at £1.9M (was that a record?) So by today's standards, that would make him a solid £20M player (possibly more).

Barnes is the trickier one to value. He had played very well for Watford, and though they put in some good displays in the top division (did they even finish runner up one year?), they were clearly a smaller side who could never hold on to their better players. I think Barnes went for £900K, though at the time there was a small doubt that he would make it big with Liverpool, even though his skill was never undoubted. At the time of purchase I would liken it to something like an Ashley Young type of signing - exciting young player, but with the best yet to come.

With hindsight, Barnes would be worth a good £30M in today's market, but at the time we bought him it was impossible to say he would go on to the THAT good for us.