The 10 most overhyped footballers of all time

#2 – Denilson

Denilson was the world's most expensive player but failed to live up to the hype

Take a look at the historical progression of the world transfer fee record, and you won’t find many names who didn’t achieve massively in the world game – from Figo to Zidane to Ronaldo. One name, unfortunately, stands out for all the wrong reasons, though, and that’s Brazilian winger Denilson, who moved to Real Betis in 1998 for a then-world record fee of £21.5m.

When he emerged on the scene for Sao Paulo in the mid-1990’s, Denilson looked like the latest in a long line of outstanding Brazilian talent. He showed remarkable dribbling skills and used all of the popular flicks and feints of the time, including the step-over technique famously used later on by Cristiano Ronaldo. The youngster starred for Brazil in the 1997 Copa America and then in 1998’s Le Tournoi – a mini-tournament designed as a warm-up for the World Cup.

But when he arrived at Betis he simply couldn’t find any consistency – a mixture of feeling the weight of the transfer fee on his shoulders, and the struggle with the step up in competition from Brazilian football to the high-quality of La Liga. He floated in and out of Betis’ first team and saw them relegated in his second season. It was a disastrous transfer by anyone’s standards and Denilson ended up moving across various clubs before retiring in 2010, never living up to the early hype that surrounded him.