.jpeg?width=1200&auto=webp&quality=75&crop=3%3A2%2Csmart&trim= "David Prutton makes '£100m' Sunderland star claim amid 340-word transfer verdict - Sunderland Echo")
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Sunderland starlet Chris Rigg is the subject of transfer interest from the Premier League
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Sunderland midfielder Chris Rigg could be worth £100 million in “two to five years”, according to EFL pundit David Prutton.
The teenage sensation has enjoyed a breakout campaign on Wearside this season, and has subsequently found himself at the centre of widespread transfer speculation involving a whole host of high-profile suitors. To that end, reports emerged over the weekend suggesting that Tottenham Hotspur could be willing to pay as much as £38 million to lure the England youth international to North London this summer, having previously forked out around £40 million to secure a similar deal for ex-Leeds United prodigy Archie Gray last year.
And while Prutton has admitted that it is difficult to know whether Rigg is actually worth such an exorbitant fee, the ex-Nottingham Forest and Sheffield Wednesday midfielder has suggested that there is a version of events in which the Sunderland academy product is valued at considerably more than that figure in the relatively near future.
What has David Prutton said about Sunderland star Chris Rigg’s transfer future?
Speaking to Football League World, Prutton said: "Chris Rigg to Spurs for £38 million... that is a lot of money. He's still such a young kid, 17 years old, bursting through at an even younger age than that, sometimes you forget how many games he's been around for given many young players are dropping off the production line and into the first-team - they've done such a good job up in Sunderland.
"Over the course of the season broadly he's been very good, I know Regis Le Bris in recent weeks has wanted those exacting standards he's set for himself for Chris to live up to once again, which I've got no doubt he'll get to. That's sometimes par for the course when you're looking at the development of a younger player.
"£38 million... is he worth it? God knows, sometimes those types of figures can be rather arbitrarily put together, but of course they've got form have Spurs of spending a lot of money on a young player. Archie Gray, who had a season at Leeds that took them all the way to the play-off final - will Chris get something similar? We will soon see.
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"What you're paying for though is potential. You could put a hell of a lot money down on a player now for say around £40 million like we're talking for Chris, and then suddenly two to five years time he's worth £100 million - that's the speculation they're looking to turn into accumulation further down the line.
"Is he worth it? God knows, only time will tell, but Spurs being slightly transitional this season, Archie's got a lot of game-time which has been wonderful for him, but as a collective, Spurs haven't hit the heights they'd have been expecting to get to.
"Big-money moves, take Brennan Johnson for example, equals a lot of responsibility and expectation, and for a young kid who is 17, that could be a hell of a lot to deal with. So, I'm sure he'll be guided very well and firmly, but undoubtedly a real star in the making."