Sunderland: £8m Chelsea signing proved to be expensive flop - View | OneFootball

The £8m signing of Papy Djilobodji from Chelsea was a failure in more ways than one.

During the back end of Sunderland's Premier League era, the club made a host of expensive signings, who went on to flop.

Although the Black Cats' woeful attempts in the transfer market flopped on the pitch, the club felt the effects of such poor signings for some time after their relegation from the Premier League. As a result of their inadequacy in the market, the club slumped to consecutive relegations and ended up in League One.

While the £8m signing of Papy Djilibodji from Chelsea cannot be solely to blame for the club's demise, his signing highlighted the type of business that led to Sunderland's downfall.

Papy Djilibodji was a flop of epic proportions

The summer of 2016 must go down as the biggest mess in Sunderland's history.

Having lost their manager, Sam Allardyce, to the England job in late July, David Moyes was given the unenviable task of managing the Black Cats. To make life even more difficult, the Scot had just three weeks to prepare a squad for the new season.

In a summer that included the Wearsiders' most expensive flop of all time, Didier Ndong, the club also signed Djilobodji from Chelsea in a deal worth £8m. Having never made a Premier League appearance for the West London club, the transfer represented a significant risk for the club.

Although the Senegalese international started the first game of the 2016/17 season on the bench, he emerged as Moyes' first choice at centre-back and made 18 league appearances for the club in his first season on Wearside.

During his spell in the side, Sunderland won just four of their 18 Premier League matches. To make matters even worse, the centre-back was given a four-match ban in January 2017, following an incident with West Bromwich Albion's Darren Fletcher that was not picked up by the on-field officials.

He did not play another minute of the season as Sunderland were relegated to the Championship - a fate which was long in the making.

In September 2018, Djilobodji had his contract terminated by the club, after the defender returned to the club late and unfit earlier in the summer. His transfer was a failure of epic proportions from start to finish and a complete waste of money for the club.

Papy Djilobodji was part of a wider problem at Sunderland

Much of the reason for Sunderland's demise was their inability in the transfer market.

Towards the back end of their spell in the Premier League, the club wasted significant money on players who were simply not cut out for English football's top flight. Why the club carried out such deals is hard to fathom, but they ultimately cost the club its Premier League status.

During the same summer, the Wearsiders wasted a staggering £13.6m on Ndong, who is the club's most expensive ever signing to date. The Gabon international also had his contract terminated like Djilobodji.

Similarly to the former Chelsea man, Ndong failed to return to training in the summer of 2017 or in the months that followed. How players can have the nerve to not even show up for work is beyond belief, but it changed the club's policy in years to come.

Following Kyril Louis-Dreyfus' arrival at Sunderland in 2021, the club have been heading in a different direction. Keen to learn from his predecessors, the Black Cats owner has implemented a sensible transfer model, which has seen the club carry out shrewd business in the market.

Gone are the days of wasted millions and instead, the club have assembled an entire starting eleven which cost less than the fee paid for Djilobodji in 2016, as revealed by journalist Michael Graham.

Credit must be given to the Sunderland chairman and director of football, Kristjaan Speakman, for carrying out such business.

The £8m signing of Djilobodji from Chelsea was a stab in the dark, given he had never made a Premier League appearance for his former club.

As if the fee was not bad enough, the centre-back left on a free along with Ndong. The losses from the two deals combined added up to £21.6m.