Chelsea pledged to pay about $75 million to buy Spanish left-back Marc Cucurea from Brighton, bringing the South Coast club about $55 million in profits to sell the player he joined just 12 months ago.

The deal is one of the most astonishing examples to date of how much a player's value has affected his ability to handle the demands of the Premier League for even just one season.

In August of last year, Brighton bought Kokoria from Spanish Getafe for about $ 20 million, to play a great season in the English Premier League.

Manchester City, the hero, sought to include the young player from the Barcelona youth academy, but he refused the required price from Brighton and the intervention of Chelsea, now owned by investors led by American Todd Boehley, and settled the deal.

Brighton manager Graham Potter said the club did not need to sell the player but unsurprisingly admitted it was a good deal.

"I think we got the right fees and this is a new situation in which everyone won. The player got a great opportunity and the selling club got a good price and the buying club now has a good player too, so everyone is a winner."

Brighton accomplished a similar feat last year when they sold central defender Ben White, who also played only one season in the Premier League, to Arsenal for $62 million.

White rose through the youth ranks at Brighton, so this was a 100% win-win deal for the club.

As with Kokoria, the price surprised many.

In fact, the Cocoria and White deals far exceeded Brighton's $112 million payment to build the $112 million AMEX stadium.

real talent

And while Brighton have built a reputation for being unique in maximizing the value of their talents, being a player with real talent in the Premier League has had an impact on your transfer fees.

Brazilian striker Richarlison signed with Watford in August 2017 for $13 million, and a year later Everton paid more than 3 times that amount to join Goodison Park.

Spending 42 million dollars on a player who scored five goals in his first season in England seemed expensive at the time, but after his brilliance at Merseyside, he was sold to Tottenham last July for about 60 million dollars plus about 10 million more in Rewards formula.

Wolverhampton Wanderers signed striker Diogo Jota from Atletico Madrid for about 16 million dollars when he was in the second division, but after two seasons in the Premier League it is worth more than 50 million dollars with Liverpool.

With the Premier League being the number one competition in the world, it's clear that the coaches of the big teams want to sign players they can trust to play at this level.

Huge increase for every match

The effect can also be seen in smaller deals. Ireland defender Nathan Collins, who has made just 18 Premier League appearances for Burnley, has seen his value rise from the $15m Burnley paid to Stoke City to the nearly $25m paid by Wolverhampton Wanderers last month.

This reflects an increase of more than $500,000 for every game Collins has played in the Premier League.

However, Kokoria's market value increased by $1.5 million per match.

Former Arsenal defender Martin Keown described the Chelsea deal as "illogical".

"It's an unbelievable amount. I think it's overrated. I think that while Kokoria is great, there is a better group out there," he told Talksport.

"On the eve of the new season, he came to make a statement that included this kind of deal. Is this an overspend? I think it might be."