tbf I haven't seen one solid source say Real have actually offered £80m+ for Bale, believed to be in the region is what's being said. Monaco and PSG have been the big spenders but what really kicked up fees has been the Russians and Abramovic, those russian clubs paid ridiculous fees and wages Real always spend big and it didn't affect overall fees just the fees of the best players, once a few more rich owners started throwing around megabucks it's gotten out of hand, the owners of the Russian clubs and Abramovic are the cause of general transfer fees going through the roof in England, then City added to that, PSG and Monaco have made it worse in Europe in general now too.
Says the supporter of the club who paid 20 million for Downing, 20 million for Keane, 20 million for a crock from Italy, 15 million for Henderson and 35 million for Carroll. Yeah Abramovich is the only problem with high spenders in England
Have to be seriously naive to think we were the first. It just happens to have worked long term for us.
But the main reason for that is that you have been able to sustain that spending long term. You wasted £30m on Mutu and Veron, but were still able to throw £30m at Shevchenko a couple of years later, then the same on Malouda and Bosingwa, then even more on Torres and still had the cash to spend around £180 million over the next two summers. And that's not even considering all the cash you were able to throw after average signings and potential youngsters like Parker, SWP, Bridge, Johnson, Kalou, Del Horno etc. Liverpool wasted their cash on Carroll and Downing, and couldn't even stretch to £6m for Dempsey a year later. It's worked long term for Chelsea cos you don't have to live with your mistakes, Roman just writes them off. Whereas any other club which buys a flop has their future spending limited by it. Even clubs like Utd at the height of our financial advantage - when we spent £28m on Veron it was another five years before we could afford to spend a decent amount on a CM, and likewise when we lost money on Hargreaves.
To a point but after Shevchenko we didn't spend big for the next few windows until the Torres one. From memory I think we bought Malouda one summer and Bosingwa the other so that's pretty much about 30 million over 2 summers. Hardly outrageous spending. Parker, SWP, Bridge, Johnson, Kalou, Del Horno etc were all purchased during those early Roman years when the spending was frankly outrageous + we were playing catch up. I don't think it has been as bad (Torres aside) since the mistake with Shevchenko. We spent a fair bit last summer but that was with the C.L money we won. I agree Roman's presense means we have been able to get away with mistakes more than most but we are not the only ones. Madrid needed bail outs, Barca could barely pay their wages last year, all the Russian clubs have wealthy owners, ditto City now and the French clubs. Before that there was the likes of Jack Walker etc. Frankly lazy to blame it all on Roman.
Pretty sure it was closer to £60m over those two summers - Anelka and some others joined around the same time IIRC. Not outrageous, I agree, but it showed that Chelsea could afford to swallow losses without flinching, whilst pretty much every other club in England at the time couldn't. The situation has obviously changed now other Russians and Arabs have followed Abramovich's lead, but for a good 4-5 year period you had a level of financial superiority that had never been seen before. Other clubs had spent big, but could never sustain it at that level for so long. Even Blackburn with Walker's millions had limits, as seen by the sale of Shearer and the lack of replacements. Not saying you were the first club to spend big or that it's bad or wrong, or ruined football blah blah whatever. Just pointing out that you were the first club to be able to spend so big and with no real concern over value, long term stability or flops.
Roman is not the only one who can write off expensive mistakes and ensure that their club does not suffer. He is the most high profile and the earliest and most sustained. Others have done it since: the city owners, PSG, amongst others. United, arsenal, the scousers whilst not exactly poor have to be careful with their expenditures. The scousers have suffered greatly from Dalglish's blunders. I predicted that they would take years to recover. If they had Roman, they will not have been in today's predicament. I think the likes of Chelsea and Real totally distort the market. Wenger has got a valid point when he refers to 'financial doping'.
Not really, he just did it on a bigger scale. However the Jack Walkers of this world had clubs spending beyond their means long before Roman turned up. Most of the bigger clubs today are probably in the position they are in because at some point during their history they would have received financial benefits to enable them to get the ball rolling so to speak. United didn't start out with a world wide fanbase and 70k all seater stadium!!
Ray Wilkins speaks http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/fo...ving-Chelsea-Manchester-United-step-down.html
Yeah, no one is saying they ruined football, they just helped along the ability of clubs to start asking for inflated fees for players because they know the pot was bottomless.
And helped the agents demand inflated wages for mid range players too. It's nothing that hadn't happened before, but Chelsea's money meant the clubs and agents could get what they wanted, and could keep getting it season after season.
Exactly, it's hardly a coincidence that sugar daddies and massive player fee and wage inflation appeared simultaneously. Now PSG and Monaco are preventing it from reverting, even a little with to FFP, Madrid have always been Madrid but they can only buy so many players, having several clubs that can throw that kind of money means the fees will still go up and up
