Coventry City have Man Utd figure in part to thank for big Viktor Gyokeres profit - it's not Amorim | OneFootball

Coventry could bring in a bit more profit from the deal for the big Swede and they have Dan Ashworth to thank.

Coventry City will be thrilled to see Viktor Gyokeres smashing it in Portugal with Sporting CP. The Sky Blues will feel more fulfilled when they look back at the business they did for the striker, both incoming and outgoing, which could get better still.

Victor Gyokeres is the talk of the town at the moment. A hat-trick against Pep Guardiola in Sporting's 4-1 Champions League win over Manchester City would definitely have put him on the map, if he somehow wasn't already on there before.

His career has taken a strange route to get to the top, and it all stems from one mistake by Manchester United's current sporting director involving Coventry City.

Dan Ashworth has had a brilliant career, becoming the behind the scenes man for Newcastle United and now Man United.

Before the two, Ashworth had a three-year tenure with Brighton, conducting some excellent transfer business, which has been praised highly in the footballing world. But he did make one slip up he will still probably be scratching his head at involving Gyokeres.

Many would've highlighted Gyokeres' rise and breakthrough under soon-to-be Man United boss Ruben Amorim, but Coventry were actually the team who gave him his big break, as anyone worth their EFL salt will tell you.

Whilst at Brighton, the Swede found it a struggle to fit into the Seagulls side, enduring loan spells with German side St. Pauli and a horrid period in the Championship with Swansea City.

Despite his failures with Swansea, the Sky Blues took an interest in Gyokeres and began an excellent saga for themselves.

Gyokeres found the net four times in 20 games, but it was enough to convince Mark Robins to sign him for just £1m in the summer of 2021 from Brighton, after just eight appearances and one goal with the Seagulls.

Ashworth, at the time, probably didn't see much of it, but the striker netted 17 goals in the Championship the following season for Coventry. Meanwhile, Brighton's technical director was ready to jump ship to Newcastle, but surely knew in the back of his mind what a mistake he had made.

34 goal contributions followed in the next campaign for Gyokeres, and before you know it, Coventry found themselves in a serious cash cow of €20 million, which seems a small figure now but was decent enough for the Championship club to accept from Sporting CP.

Sky Blues can still gain from Gyokeres' future

With Gyokeres scoring for fun and major European clubs interested, the transfer saga may not be over for Coventry just yet.

The Swedish bagsman reportedly has a €100 million release clause labelled into his contract, and with the likes of Barcelona, Arsenal, Liverpool and Chelsea snooping around, this could quite easily be met.

This can prove beneficial for Coventry. The Championship side now have a 10% sell-on clause from their deal with the Portuguese side, which was originally 15% until Sporting paid it out, seeing Coventry earn €1m last summer.

If that release clause was met, they could be entitled to €8m as that would be 10% of the €80m profit.

Coventry have clearly become the true winners in the deal over time and there should be massive credit shown to the Sky Blues board for including the sell-on clause.

If only Ashworth had the same faith in the striker. He (or more so Brighton) could be reaping the rewards of the deal, but instead, with United also linked with Gyokeres as Sporting's head coach heads for Old Trafford, Ashworth could be involved in the deal which, not only benefits Cov once more, but also pay 80 times more than he sold him for when at Brighton.

It's a true full circle moment for the Man United sporting director.