Antoine Semenyo’s rise is a reminder the big clubs’ scouting systems are not infallible, that not all players will flower at the same time. Fulham, Arsenal, Crystal Palace, Millwall, Reading and Tottenham rejected the schoolboy Semenyo. At 15, he took a year’s absence from the game.

A decade on, a circuitous route to the top alights at Manchester City, who beat a queue of big hitters to his signature. Bournemouth’s ability to find talent the elite passed over continues to prove profitable. Pep Guardiola’s squad has another player who pairs physical power with a high skill level. It also adds a long-throw specialist to the armoury; City are towards the bottom of the metrics in that voguish category.

Semenyo’s initial £62.5m fee fits City’s practice, after the mixed results of lavishing £100m on Jack Grealish, of preferring to buy players at about that price point. A contract extension signed in the summer to stay at Bournemouth locked in the fee, and he follows Dean Huijsen, who headed to Real Madrid last summer, in leaving the Vitality Stadium for a pre-agreed valuation. Though Liverpool and Manchester United had interest in the summer, neither made the decisive move when the...