Crystal Palace winger Wilfried Zaha has been seriously linked with a move to the Premier League in January, with Liverpool, Arsenal and Manchester City all thought to be monitoring his situation, but given the fees mentioned, is he really worth all the hype?

Since breaking into the Eagles starting eleven back in 2010-11, Zaha has proven to be a consistent, dependable and exciting young talent, making 105 appearances in two and a bit seasons and scoring 14 goals across all competitions. He has ignored speculation up until this point, rather reasonably coming to the conclusion that his development is best aided by playing regularly each week, something that is guaranteed at Palace but is far from assured at a top Premier league club.

However, speculation over the 19-year-old’s future is rife and after a bright start to this season, coupled with the fact that he won The Football League’s Young Player of the Year award and Crystal Palace’s own award of the same name and it’s understandable why he’s garnering so much attention and he represents one of the best talents currently plying their trade outside of the top flight in England.

The club’s co-chairman Steve Parish stated (or ‘yelled’ according to the Daily Mirror’s report) this week: “He is an extraordinary talent. I said at the start of the season that keeping hold of Wilf would be like spending a lot of money on a transfer. Other sides can fly their kites but it would take £20m before we even got interested. He has got the lot, provided he keeps his feet on the ground and continues working so hard on his game – then it will all come. People would have to compensate us accordingly for losing his talent – that is what a transfer fee is. All the teams have got to understand that you get £60m in TV money if you get into the Premier League, which is where we want to get. So we’d need to be compensated for reducing our chances of getting there.”

One of the three other co-chairman Steve Browett said last week: “I can assure you that Wilfried is not ‘for sale.’ We hope that he’ll be playing Premier League football next season. For us. Even if that doesn’t happen, he’s only 19 and still learning his trade in surroundings where he is comfortable and happy. He’s on a five-year contract and we really don’t need the money. The four of us bought the club so that we could enjoy watching Palace play football, not to cash in as soon as the moneybags clubs come waving their cheque books. I hope that’s clear enough. PS – and if he keeps developing the way he has so far you’ll be reading plenty more rubbish in the Sunday papers.” Not before manager Dougie Freedman claimed that anything below £11m and “you’re getting him cheap.”

Now this speculation has aparrently sprung into life once again after Zaha struck four goals in his last two games against Burnley and Wolves and in 70 starts at Championship level, he’s scored 11 times in total. There’s certainly an element of ‘rubbish’ being written about him and I don’t doubt that the club has any pressing need to sell him, but are you really getting a £20m player if you buy Zaha?

Of course, players have shown that they’re able to make the step up in recent times from the second tier, but for every Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, there’s a Marvin Sordell and just because he’s forced his way into Stuart Pearce’s England U-21 side of late, that doesn’t mean he’s all of a sudden worth north of the £10m mark when he’s untested and unproven on the biggest stage.

Inflation with English players is common place, as is misplaced hype, with the Guardian’s Richard Williams tipping Zaha to start for the national side at the 2014 World Cup for Roy Hodgson shortly after we crashed out of Euro 2012 to Italy on penalties. It was a patently ridiculous statement to make and it just increases the burden on what is clearly a talented young player.

Arsenal have shown a willingness to delve into the market for exciting young wingers and forwards from the lower leagues in the past by signing both Oxlade-Chamberlain and Theo Walcott in the past after relatively little experience and both have lived up to their price-tags in a way, so there’s no denying that the move up could work, but there’s a danger that he could be thrown in too deeply, with a price-tag not befitting of his actual ability and flounder.

At least at Liverpool, the likes of Raheem Sterling and Suso have excelled so far this campaign in Brendan Rodgers side because they haven’t had a fee to justify, even if the hype from their reserve and youth-team outings did mean that they had been called for by some sections of the Anfield faithful long before they were given their chance.

It’s clear that paying £20m for a 19-year-old winger without top flight experience is something of an English disease, as is hyping the player in question up beyond belief. He could be good enough to play for the clubs he’s been linked with one day, but he’s not just yet. He’d be best placed sticking put where he is right now, for the rest of the season at the very least, continuing his footballing education at a club that appreciates him and allows him to make mistakes, otherwise the media will continue to set him up for an almighty fall.

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