Former Liverpool starlet Tom Ince has been granted a swift return to the Championship after joining Watford following Reading's relegation from the English second tier.
The 31-year-old has signed a two-year contract at Vicarage Road, with the option of a third year, after joining the Hornets for an undisclosed fee.
That transfer fee is believed to cost at little as £50,000 courtesy of a shockingly-low release clause in his Reading contract following their relegation. Given the multi-millions spent in the Premier League and Championship, such a figure inevitably looks out of place.
Ince will now look to help Watford win promotion back to the Premier League following their relegation in 2022, having previously established himself as one of the deadliest forwards in the Championship.
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Leaving Liverpool for Blackpool in 2011 at the end of his contract, the Reds actually failed in an attempt to re-sign him 18 months later. Meanwhile, the former England Under-21s international would memorably turn down a switch to Inter Milan when leaving Blackpool in 2014.
In truth, going on to enjoy brief stints in the Premier League with Crystal Palace, Hull City and Huddersfield Town, Ince has endured his rollercoaster since leaving Anfield behind. But while not always at his best in recent years, the chance to sign a proven Championship forward for just £50k was too good an opportunity for Watford to turn down.
If he helps the Hornets win promotion, he'll be one of the bargains of the summer. And having previously attracted interest from both Liverpool and Inter Milan, here's how Ince ended up being a £50k man...
Although not the busiest transfer window in Liverpool’s history, the January 2013 mid-season window remains one of the Reds’ most successful.
Brendan Rodgers brought in Daniel Sturridge from Chelsea and Philippe Coutinho from Inter Milan for a combined fee of £20.5m, while also managing to offload Joe Cole to West Ham United and terminate Nuri Sahin’s loan move from Real Madrid half-a-season early. A 100% success rate, club bosses had every right to be patting themselves on the back for a job well done once the window ‘slammed’ shut.
However, Liverpool had tried and failed to complete a third signing that month too. Rodgers had attempted to bring former Reds youngster Tom Ince back to Anfield.
Son of former Liverpool captain Paul, the England Under-21s international, who made his one and only appearance for the club as a substitute against Northampton Town in the League Cup in September 2010, had joined Blackpool at the end of his Reds contract in 2011 after rejecting a new deal at Anfield. His father, who was manager of Notts County at the time and had signed the forward on loan in late-2010, described the contract offer as "derisory" and called Liverpool "silly" for refusing to let Ince re-join his club on loan if he didn’t sign a new long-term contract.
“If you are a young player waiting for a chance at a top club, what do you do?” Ince Jr later told The Telegraph about his Anfield exit. “Stay in the top facility, enjoying all the best travel, wearing all the best sports gear?
“Or do you say I am going to be brave and step away even if that means going to League One or the Championship? Harry Kane is the prime example. He went on loan, went back to Tottenham and the rest is history. Credit to him. When people saw him at Norwich or Leicester, who saw his next step?
“He backed himself and now people forget the doubts they might have had. I think more are seeing it that way. Look at Tammy Abraham and Nathaniel Chalobah. They have done the right thing for their career by leaving Chelsea.
“My dream was to play at Anfield but I could not waste time feeling my way was blocked. You have to take decisions and do what is best for your career. I did not want to leave. I was training with the first team. But I needed to go and show what I was about.
“I had been to Notts County on loan and that was the eye opener. It was League One, but it was the atmosphere and feeling of playing against grown men who are doing this because it is their life, to put food on the table.
“I was 18, playing in front of 10,000 or 15,000 who have paid to watch you. It was better than playing in front of 20 or 30 fans in a reserve game. There is no sense of reward, inspiration or even motivation if you do not have that game at 3pm on a Saturday to look forward to. I did not want to go back to that.”
Receiving a £250k compensation fee from the Tangerines following Ince’s exit, the Red also negotiated a sell-on clause which entitled them to 35% of any fee that Blackpool later received when selling the forward. Little did either club know that Liverpool would want to re-sign the player less than 18 months later.
Ince flourished at Bloomfield Road as he became one of the deadliest players in the Championship. Returning eight goals and 10 assists from 41 appearances as Blackpool lost in the 2012 play-off final, he was even better in 2012/13, to earn interest from his former club, although the Tangerines’ fortunes declined.
Finishing the campaign with a whopping 18 goals and 14 assists from 44 Championship appearances, his record stood at 13 goals and 10 assists from 23 outings by the time the January transfer window opened. Linked with a switch to the Premier League as a result, with the ECHO reporting in December 2012 that Liverpool were closing in on a £4m deal to bring the then-20-year-old back to Anfield.
Blackpool were said to value Ince at around £6m but the Reds were hopeful of a significant discount courtesy of their 35% sell-on clause. Meanwhile, as managing director Ian Ayre held talks with Chelsea over a potential swoop for Sturridge, it was claimed that a transfer for Ince was closer to being finalised in time for the window opening on January 1.
Despite only leaving Liverpool 16 months earlier, it was felt by club bosses that by re-signing Ince they would be putting right the mistake of losing him in the first place. Yet as Sturridge was confirmed as an official Reds player on January 2, there was no sign of the England Under-21s international completing his return.
Then-Blackpool boss Michael Appleton would soon confirm that the Tangerines had received a bid from Liverpool, only to reveal it had been rejected and they hadn’t heard back from the Reds since.
“He [Ince] is going through an indifferent period because of all the speculation but he is coping with it really well,” he said. “I know how difficult it can be, so he has to take credit for that and I am sure that once the speculation settles down, his performances will pick up again.
“Liverpool made an offer two weeks ago but we have not received anything since. It was a case of, 'That's not enough. You'll have to do better if you want him'. Until that changes, he will stay here.”
Liverpool would end up signing Coutinho in an £8.5m deal later that month, with it suggested in some sections that the Brazilian was targeted after Blackpool had frustrated the Reds in negotiations for Ince. The Telegraph would later report that chairman Karl Oyston was not answering his phone, with The Mirror suggesting that the Tangerines were holding out for £8.5m overall as they wanted to pocket £6m themselves.
Ince would later admit his frustration at Blackpool blocking the move when speaking to The Telegraph in 2017.
“Liverpool was very close but the Blackpool chairman did not want to be out of pocket because Liverpool owned a percentage of the sell-on fee,” Ince recalled. “He made it difficult and they would not let me go.
“That was disappointing because I felt I would have been given a chance under Brendan Rodgers.”
Come the end of January, after signing Coutinho, Rodgers would admit that a move for Ince then looked unlikely.
"Ince was one where we could have made a deal but it looks like it's a bit complicated," he said. "I don't think there will be any more coming in now.
"It will be difficult [to sign Ince]. It is also about affordability as well. If Tom stays at Blackpool it doesn't mean he will never come to Liverpool but maybe in this window it looks like it will be a difficult one for us."
It was later claimed that Rodgers was still intending to make a renewed bid for Ince that summer, with the forward admitting a January switch hadn’t been that close.
"There was something about Liverpool coming in for me in January - and to go to a top club like that would have been fantastic,” he said. “But I have to realise, it's about playing football and I don't think any of the moves were close.
"It's great having that speculation and it's very flattering. To have teams of that magnitude saying you're a decent player, it gives me a smile and flatters me a lot.
"For me though it's about putting my faith in Blackpool because without that club, my team-mates and the fans I wouldn't be Football League Young Player of the Year and the player I am now.
"My dream is to play at the top level and to achieve my ambitions, but it's all about timing and patience, so when you get to the top you are ready to go and not jumping too soon."
Ince would end up staying at Blackpool until January 2014 when he joined Crystal Palace on loan. By this point, his father was manager at Bloomfield Road. And following speculation of a fresh Liverpool bid for Ince, who had also been left frustrated in efforts to sign Mohamed Salah and Yevhen Konoplyanka, he later claimed his son had actually rejected a move to Anfield.
"Liverpool were in but I don't think Thomas is ready to go to Liverpool yet,” he said. "Brendan [Rodgers] has done very well there and he does play the kids but for his progression as a footballer it needed to be a Stoke, a Swansea, a Palace or a Hull at this point.
"Maybe in two or three years' time that might be a move for him."
Meanwhile, Ince Jr told TalkSPORT that he had held talks with Swansea City and Stoke City prior to settling on Palace.
"I went to Swansea and spoke to them, then I spoke to Steve Parish and then on the way back up north I spoke to Mark Hughes and Stoke," he said. "The whole saga wasn't entirely true, I spoke to three clubs who I felt I would fit in well at and Crystal Palace were the one for me.
"I came down to London, spoke to Steve [Parish] and Tony and I got that sense that Palace is the place for me for the rest of the season and now I've just got to show the faith that they've placed in me."
Out of contract at Blackpool at the end of the 2013/14 season, Ince would score one goal from eight appearances during his temporary stint with Palace, before joining Hull City on a free transfer. At this point, interest from Liverpool, who had nearly won the Premier League that season, had evaporated.
In truth, they had outgrown that type of signing. Meanwhile, his performances for Palace in the Premier League hardly compared to glowing scouting reports from the Championship.
Yet despite an Anfield return now being off the table, he still infamously rejected big-money offers from Inter Milan and Monaco as he attracted vast interest across Europe.
“After lengthy discussions with my family I have decided that my immediate future in the game lies in the Premier League,” he said at the time.
“I am flattered to have received such strong interest from several big European clubs. But I believe at this early stage of my career I need to continue my football education in England.
“I would like to thank the clubs overseas for their interest and kindness. I still have ambitions to one day play in Europe. I am now looking forward to what lies ahead next season.”
Meanwhile, he told The Telegraph in 2017: “When Inter were interested in me I stood in the San Siro and the English boy inside me told me to go to the Premier League.”
However, in an interview with The Athletic in 2021, he admitted he now regrets that decision looking back.
“I think the situation with Inter Milan and Monaco (are regrets),” he conceded. “I look back and… it’s difficult because I always compare it to now and there are British players going abroad a lot.
“When I had that chance it felt like it wasn’t at that point yet. Now you see the cultural crossover and it’s perhaps a bit easier to settle abroad. More managers speak English, more players speak a second language. Then you’ve got like RB Leipzig and Dortmund who give young English players a lot of games.
“When I had it though, it was a surreal moment. The history with my dad and Inter, us standing there in the San Siro.
“I felt I’d worked so hard as a young lad and the Premier League was right there, it was the next step. If I could do well there it could catapult me to England and all that. I was wondering that if the move abroad didn’t work out then would I get lost? I was young. If that situation came about now I wouldn’t think twice.
“I think that’s where the relationship with my dad came in. He went when he was 27. I was explaining that I was a young lad, (in a) different country without my family.
“I look back now and it’s something I regret but you never know what could have happened. I might have got lost, I could have played in there for five or six years. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.”
In truth, Ince’s switches to both Crystal Palace and Hull City did not work out.
“I had a taste of the Premier League with six months at Crystal Palace but it did not work out,” he told The Telegraph. “Tony Pulis played a different way and I did not suit it.
“At Hull it was similar. I started the first few games but then the manager went a different way.”
Ince was loaned out, back to the Championship to Nottingham Forest in October 2014, before joining Derby County on loan until the end of the season in February 2015. There he would re-establish himself as one of the best players in the English second tier, returning 11 goals and two assists from 18 appearances to earn a permanent £4.75m switch to Pride Park.
He would follow that up with 12 goals and seven assists from 42 Championship appearances as Derby lost in the play-off semi-finals, before returning 15 goals and eight assists from 50 appearances in all competitions in 2016/17. Along with his time at Blackpool, which prompted interest from Liverpool in the first place, it remains the best spell of his career.
While the Rams weren’t destined to return to the Premier League, Ince was and he joined newly-promoted Huddersfield Town for £10m in the summer of 2017. Yet while he would help keep the Terriers up, he was on the move again just a year later, after only two goals and no assists in 37 appearances, as he returned to the Championship with Stoke City in a £12m deal following their relegation from the top-flight.
Never replicating his Blackpool or Derby form with the Potters, he was loaned to Luton Town in February 2021 and Reading in January 2022. Ince Sr would join him at the Madejski Stadium the following month, taking over initially as caretaker manager before being handed the job permanently after avoiding relegation, as the pair worked together at a third different club.
Following Ince Jr’s release from Stoke, he unsurprisingly joined Royals permanently last summer as he signed a three-year deal.
The 31-year-old has actually enjoyed an impressive enough individual 2022/23 season, registering nine goals and five assists from 39 appearances. However, with his campaign ended early because of injury in March, and with Ince Sr losing his job in April, he was unable to help Reading avoid relegation to League One.
Still under-contract at Reading, The Mirror reported last month that Ince could now be on the move again this summer because of a shockingly-low release clause following their relegation with it claimed he would be available for just £50,000.
It seems highly unlikely that the 31-year-old will get another shot at Premier League football, having ultimately underwhelmed in brief stints at Crystal Palace, Hull City, and Huddersfield Town. As a result, now a decade since his name would have last been on Liverpool transfer shortlists, the Reds will no longer regret losing Ince back in 2011.
Where once they wanted to right a transfer wrong, missing out on bringing the former England Under-21s international back to Anfield ultimately proved to be a blessing in disguise.
Yet still a proven Championship star, Ince’s eye-catching campaign for a struggling Reading side demonstrates he could still prove to be an absolute bargain. And with Watford winning the race for his signature as they look to win promotion to the Premier League, they'll hope the forward proves to be the best £50k they ever spent.
A version of this story was first published on May 28, 2023.
