Real Madrid's 34-year-old striker Karim Benzema may have just become the oldest player to win the Ballon d'Or since Sir Stanley Matthews claimed the inaugural award in 1956 aged 41, but the Champions League holders are also Europe's front-runners when it comes to their track record of recruiting young players who possess the potential to become the star names of tomorrow.
The CIES Football Observatory has released a report into the recruitment of every club across Europe's top five leagues -- the English Premier League, Spain's LaLiga, the German Bundesliga, Italy's Serie A and Ligue 1 in France -- to assess the age and profile of the players they have signed in recent years.
Players who graduated through the club's youth system are not taken into account and neither are those who were recruited without accruing any prior senior professional football experience elsewhere. However, all players signed on loan are factored into the data.
The study is broken down into two parts with the first focused on the average age (at time of signing) of the players currently in the squad, whereas the second part analyses the transfer policies pursued over the past 10 years (for the 50 clubs that have been ever-present in the big five leagues over that period).
When it comes to incoming transfers over the last decade, Real Madrid sit clear above their rivals at the top of the table with the lowest average age of players signed. Of the 12 Italian, 10 English, 10 German, nine French and nine Spanish clubs taken into consideration and the total of 3,788 signings they have collectively made in that period, it is the 14-time European champions who emerge with the lowest average age (22.87 years).
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New @CIES_Football ⚽️ Weekly Post 🗞️ ranks teams always present in the big-5⃣ during last decade according to average age at recruitment of players signed 🤠 @realmadrid most focused on young talents ahead of @borussia & @BVB 🌱 Full data 👉 https://t.co/O4bMfx8S4U pic.twitter.com/P2qsQG04us
— CIES Football Obs (@CIES_Football) October 17, 2022
Here's a more detailed look at the biggest European heavyweights to appear within the top 20 places at either end of the CIES spectrum along with some examples of the individual signings that ultimately ended up determining their average.
Youngest average age of recruitment by club (2013-2022)
1. Real Madrid (43 players recruited, average age of 22.87 years)
Thanks to a string of high-profile deals for emerging stars such as Vinicius Junior, Rodrygo and Eduardo Camavinga helping to keep their average low, Real Madrid lead the way at the top of CIES' table ahead of German side Borussia Monchengladbach (23.36 years), who are second on the list.
3. Borussia Dortmund (76 players, 23.57 years)
Dortmund have a reputation for recruiting bright young talent and immediately offering them valuable first-team experience. Erling Haaland, Jude Bellingham, Thorgan Hazard and Ousmane Dembele were all snapped up and given early starts by the German side only to quickly become established senior stars in their own right.
10. Bayern Munich (53 players, 24.26 years)
As the biggest club in the Bundesliga bar none, Bayern have always been able to flex their muscle and make marquee signings. However, the Bavarians are also shrewd when it comes to filling out their enviable squad with burgeoning talent such as Thiago Alcantara, Mario Gotze, Joshua Kimmich, Kingsley Coman, Serge Gnabry and Leon Goretzka.
13. Barcelona (73, 24.48 years)
Supplementing the intake from their famed La Masia youth academy, Barcelona have also recruited a plethora of comparatively young players in recent years from Jordi Alba and Neymar through to Frenkie de Jong and Pedri.
16. Liverpool (55 players, 24.65 years)
Liverpool have developed a happy knack of identifying and signing the right player, rather than the biggest name, especially during Jurgen Klopp's tenure. Lots of relatively young arrivals have fallen into that category since 2013 such as Harvey Elliott and Fabio Carvalho.
17. Tottenham Hotspur (51 players, 24.69 years)
Admittedly, not all of Tottenham's fledgling signings have gone on to become first-team staples. But for every Benjamin Stambouli, Clinton N'Jie or Georges-Kevin N'Koudou there's been a Christian Eriksen, Eric Dier or Son Heung-Min.
Oldest average age of recruitment by club (2013-2022)
1. Chelsea (59 players recruited, average age 26.71 years)
Chelsea have come out with the highest average player recruitment age of any club in European football's big five leagues, with recent deals for veterans like Raheem Sterling and Pierre Emerick-Aubameyang continuing that trend.
2. Inter Milan (87 players, 26.44 years)
Inter are not averse to recruiting players who have been round the block a few times with well-travelled senior pros such as Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Edin Dzeko, Aleksandar Kolarov, Hakan Calhanoglu, Alexis Sanchez and Arturo Vidal all coming on board in the past few years.
4. Manchester United (47 players, 26.17 years)
United -- who have had a decidely mixed record in the transfer market since Sir Alex Ferguson retired -- have one of the highest average player recruitment ages in Europe thanks to big-money moves for ageing big-named stars like Cristiano Ronaldo, Casemiro, Raphael Varane and Edinson Cavani -- and those are just the signings made within the last two years.
5. AC Milan (94 players, 26.14 years)
Coming in narrowly behind their Milanese rivals, when it comes to recruitment the Rossoneri tend to mix youthful potential with a liberal sprinkling of elder statesman of which the incomparable Zlatan Ibrahimovic is the eldest of them all, having rejoined the club in December 2019 at the age of 38.
6. Atletico Madrid (66 players, 26.04 years)
In charge since 2011, Atletico coach Diego Simeone certainly prefers to pad out his teams with grizzled, battle-hardened campaigners as the recruitment of Antoine Griezmann, Mario Mandzukic, Axel Witsel, Diego Costa and Luis Suarez can attest.
11. Manchester City (41 players, 25.93 years)
It's something of a shock to find that City have signed fewer players than any other of the 50 European clubs included in CIES' breakdown. Their focus has shifted dramatically in recent years, but City had made a habit of signing journeymen and elder pros like Alvaro Negredo, Bacary Sagna and Frank Lampard in those first few years following Sheikh Mansour's takeover in 2008.
12. Paris Saint-Germain (53 players, 25.93 years)
Another club who have only felt the true flushes of powerful financial clout in recent years, PSG certainly sign a lot of younger talent from around the French leagues but their squad has also been bolstered by accomplished veterans such as Lionel Messi (who was 34 when he arrived at the Parc des Princes), Gianluigi Buffon and Sergio Ramos.
15. Juventus (73 players, 25.50 years)
Juventus are another club at the bottom end of the CIES' list who have had their average player recruitment age shifted significantly by the expensive signing of a post-30 Ronaldo. Other than the Portuguese star, the Bianconeri have also completed a selection of similar deals for Paul Pogba, Angel Di Maria, Aaron Ramsey, Leonardo Bonucci, Dani Alves, Patrice Evra and the returning Buffon following his brief sojourn in Paris.