Leicester have sold lots of players (mainly average) for a lot of money in recent years. Chilwell for nearly £50million is crazy considering the effects of the virus etc
One part HG Tax, one part clubs knowing that Uncle Roman isn't going to be struggling to meet release clauses It's the same reason The Sheikh Mansour Team had to pay up to sign Ferran Torres from the Valencia dumpster fire while Dani Parejo was free to go to anyone who had a contract ready
Hazard was sold last season and they spent that money on Kovacic and Pulisic. Morata went for about the same as Werner, somehow, so they've also signed Chilwell and Ziyech on top of that. £80m+? We've currently spent about £2m, I think.
And Havertz to come for another £90m, and then will be Thiago Silvas signing on fee which won't be declared, but we all know there is no such thing as a 'free' transfer.
It doesn't really compare, as you've picked a very narrow window during which they had a transfer ban. Go back an additional season and they spend another £80m and we spend £25m. One more and it's £50m to £25m. A couple more and it's £120m to a negative spend. They constantly outspend us on transfers and have a substantially larger wage bill by about £100m a season. That's not going to change in this window. They'll spend far more than we do.
The reason the last few seasons are relevant is that our revenues caught up recently. I would expect them to spend an additional 50m above us this window as our covid loss is about that much more than them and they have CL income too. But once the stadium is fully operational and if we can get back in the CL we will be able to outspend them.
On who? Every player (any good) will have gone to City,United,Pool and Chelsea while our team will still be creaking (but I hope not!)
We'll be able to spend more than we have, but they don't really have a spending limit. We shouldn't be attempting to go head-to-head with the likes of them, City, Utd and Liverpool, either. We need to update our academy structure and think like Dortmund and Ajax do. Brute financial strength puts us near the top in the Premier League, but never close enough to really compete. We need to be smarter and find sustainable, long-term methods of getting more bang for our buck, as we have in the recent past. Last season shows what happens when we take our eyes off the ball for a short period. We can't afford to repeat that.
There was an "and" in there. Most of Ajax's current side are signings from elsewhere too, even the youngsters.
I didn't say we should outspend them, just that they no longer have a lot more resources than us and this is already being reflected in the latest spending. Five years ago our turnover was less than two thirds of Chelsea's and it is now about the same. I think we do have the potential to have the strongest finances in the PL. The trouble with a policy to do things smarter than the rest is that it isn't sustainable as there is no long term edge. The only route to long term success is through money.
