[davezatyowa]

Victorinox chef knives are a great value... widely used in professional kitchens, good quality, and very affordable. Victorinox regularly gets top ratings for its kitchen knives. I have a couple of the Victorinox knives that I enjoy using, even though I mostly use more expensive Japanese knives. You can find examples on amazon.co.uk by searching "Victorinox chef knife".

The 5" Global knife you're considering will almost certainly be too short to be your main cooking knife. Cutting up large veggies with a short knife can get frustrating. The Mercer is not a bad choice.

You'll also need to consider how they're going to be sharpened. All knives eventually get dull with use...

 

[davezatyowa]

Of these, the first one is my favorite because of it's low price and great reviews (the dishwasher safe-ness is quite questionable, but I always hand wash knives anyway).

I don't know much about this brand (present-day Sheffield is not usually the reputable classic made-in-UK stuff). Be careful about the Amazon reviews. I noted that almost all of the Amazon reviews were for knife block sets, *not* the 8-inch chef's knife you're considering.

 

[davezatyowa]

FWIW, I've bought a lot of cheap knives over the years. The least expensive knives I've ever loved?... Victorinox. I still like'em a lot, even though I now have more costly knives. They're comfortable, nimble, sharp-out-of-the-box, have excellent profile and geometry, good grind. They cut/slice very well, and strangely enough, that could not always be said for some of the more expensive knives I've bought. They'll need to be sharpened more often than a good Japanese knife, but then the same is true for most European-style knives.

They are not thick... not thick like a classic Wustof blade for example. But the relative thinness of the blade helps them to glide through product without wedging the way a heavier knife often will. Occasionally the heavier classic German-style knives are called for, but for most day-to-day use I prefer to use something a bit thinner and more nimble like the Victorinox knives. Something to consider.

Here in the U.S. you can find them in most restaurant-supply stores, so they're easy to check out. But I'm not sure about in-store availability in the UK.