Paris Saint-Germain seem to be assembling a real-life version of the World XI from old FIFA games.
The footballing world has taken a ride on an emotional rollercoaster over the last week after it was sensationally revealed that Lionel Messi would be leaving his beloved Barcelona.
Despite wanting to remain at Camp Nou, the six-time Ballon d'Or winner was unable to sign a new contract under La Liga's financial restrictions and was swiftly thrust onto the transfer market.
PSG's crazy transfer business
And while the likes of Manchester City and Chelsea were briefly touted as suitors, PSG quickly emerged as frontrunners and were able to secure Messi's signature with a matter of days.
As such, the French giants were able to conclude one of the greatest transfer windows that the sport has ever seen with even their pre-Messi business attracting huge praise across the sport.
Besides, lest we forget that PSG had already snapped up Gianluigi Donnarumma, Achraf Hakimi, Sergio Ramos and Georginio Wijnaldum long before Messi was on their radar.
ENTER GIVEAWAY
It sees PSG in such a mind-boggling position of power that it has left a sour taste in the mouth of many footballs fans and when you look at their potential starting XI, it's easy to understand why.
And perhaps nothing puts the head-scratching riches of PSG's squad into context more than picking their starting XI based purely on the transfer value statistics of Transfermarkt.
While Manchester City still have the world's most valuable squad, we can remarkably reveal that PSG are able to deploy a starting XI with a combined transfer value that exceeds €700 million.
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PSG's most valuable XI
Now, before we breakdown exactly why that is so insane in the wider context of the sport, let's check out PSG's most valuable XI - without bending tactics and positions too much - down below:
GK: Gianluigi Donnarumma - €65 million
RB: Achraf Hakimi - €60 million
CB: Marquinhos - €75 million
CB: Presnel Kimpembe - €40 million
LB: Juan Bernat - €16 million
CM: Leandro Paredes - €22 million
CM: Marco Verratti - €55 million
CM: Georginio Wijnaldum - €30 million
RW: Lionel Messi - €80 million
ST: Kylian Mbappe - €160 million
LW: Neymar - €100 million
Total transfer value: €703 million
Now, just to put that magical number into context, PSG's most valuable XI is worth more than every single squad in professional football other than the world's top ten, according to Transfermarkt.
That means that the above line up is worth more than the entire squads of Inter Milan, Arsenal, Juventus, Borussia Dortmund, Napoli, AC Milan, RB Leipzig and Napoli to name just a few.
In fact, if you threw the tactics book out the window and substituted Paredes out for Mauro Icardi then you could actually make it so that PSG's XI was the world's tenth-most valuable squad.
So, yes, if ever you see fans flying the flag that PSG are building an all-star squad of the likes that we've seen before, the stats do nothing but suggest that they're pretty much bang on the money.
Naturally, neither data nor on-paper quality win trophies in the beautiful game, but it's fair to say that there are approximately zero excuses if PSG don't win the Champions League this season.