A "snip" is pushing it 😆
But if we overpaid, it wasn't by £50m since we got a highly useful player who we have relied on, so that justifies half or two thirds of that fee by itself.
And sure White's versatility might be handy considered independently, but better still is that he covers a couple of positions (second or third choice CB, first or second choice RB). Having White means almost no Cedric and almost no Holding in big matches, and that's especially important because Tomiyasu is quite brittle.
By the same token Tomiyasu was incredible value given what he can do, the only downside being his injuries.
Overall, the way we've put our new defence together, and how that defence helps our overall play, with details like Ramsdale's distribution or White's ability on the ball, is looking carefully engineered, with each player tending to bring more than one attribute to the mix. Zinchenko is yet another example whose specific skillset complements us in two directions.
Last season I was giving Arteta shit for his obsession with "specificity", but I think, the odd very high fee amortised, this could be some of the canniest transfer activity we've ever undertaken. We've moved away from trying to find individual value in the market, and towards trying to find the signings that make our squad more than the sum of its parts.
