There were three things keeping Man U from being one of the top teams again before this weekend. 1. LVG's pet system, which doesn't work in the PL. 2. Dodgy defenders, who will be replaced in January. 3. A little time to gel. Now that 1 is no longer a factor, Man U should fight it out with, and probably edge Liverpool for, fourth. The return of Man U to top team status IMO is a new low in the history of organized sports. They simply threw buckets of money at the problem until they solved it. What's the difference between that and simply selling the trophies at auction? Man U fans may point out that unlike City and Chelsea, their buckets of money were earned fairly, through acquiring a big fan base thanks largely to a better manager rather than better funding. I'd grant that if it were City or Chelsea doing this, it would be even worse, but that, to me, buying your way out of trouble, no matter what the funding, makes a mockery of competition.
redwhite, I agree with everything you say. However, if you said those things to shame the United fans, you have failed. There are probably more United plastics in the world than 'Pool and Gooner and Chavs ones put together. Those plastics will have been praying for the Glaziers to buy United back to glory, because that was the very reason why they supported United in the first place. United fans carry the selling-your-soul-for-glory motto as a badge of honour.
"The return of Man U to top team status IMO is a new low in the history of organized sports." Or the true statement of reality for the PL. Specifically that if you lose at least one of : - an extremely good manager - continuity in the (high/higher) overall standard of your squad players then your decline will be swift unless you have an academy production line or throw money at the problem.
Talkshite with a disturbingly accurate summary of the situation: [video=youtube;rf1jjRPMZMQ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rf1jjRPMZMQ[/video] Now there's a sentence I never thought I'd type.
About £250m less than Utd and that's not including the wage bill, which is roughly half that of Utd, not including the latest figures, which you'd assume are massively inflated at Old Trafford.
Its about 150million actually. About what weve just spent. Granted net is about 250million but we don't need to selp in order to buy. Hell weve practically given them away in most cases. So 150million difference. Over 20 odd years it's not reallt tgat much. Ours looks pretty damn well spent doesnt it?
So you're not counting net spend, wages or the inflation that would inflate your early Premier League spending into the stratosphere and you're impressed under those circumstances?! Well, if you ignore all of the relevant facts that don't suit your argument, then yes, you've done really well! You've practically given away certain players for the same reason that we have: You gave them much higher wages than anyone else was prepared to pay without some other big reason. You still can't get rid of the likes of Anderson because of it. One of the other massive factors in Utd's success, barring Ferguson himself, was that you were part-owned by the company that ran the game in this country. That ridiculous situation was dealt with by the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, but not before the branding had been seared into a generation of fans.
I believe i mentioned net spend? I agree we have paid players more but these have often been title winning players, champions of Europe and more. They have kinda deserved their pay rises at the time of getting them. In hindsight not all have but its hardly worrying. Our wages to turnover ratio is pretty healthy. Comfortably affordable if you like. Its fairly obvious we will have spent more. Weve won most of the titles. Weve made more money. You have made a large portion of your money through sales before reinvesting it back into the squad. Net spend is irrelevant. We get our transfer budget from different sources.
And then went with the lower figure, for no apparent reason. You've made more money because you've been willing to spend far more money, just as Chelsea and City have. Being backed and pushed by Sky, who owned a slice of the club, also helped massively, as they relentlessly promoted you.
I mentioned West Ham v Southampton U21s being streamed via Youtube a while ago and wondered if anyone else was going to follow suit. QPR v Millwall is on now, via the home side's account. Looks like this is going to become a thing.
I forgot to switch in De Gea for Adrian in my fantasy team, so that should guarantee Hull get a couple...
I hope the "Dawson is crap" brigade are watching this game, as already Dawson has made two vital interceptions. Hull 1-0 ahead at the break.
I don't know how much Spurs have spent in PL history. My point was about Man U's spending in the last transfer window, which according to http://www.transferleague.co.uk/premiership-transfers/manchester-united-transfers.html was £113,200,000, while Spurs was £7,750,000. The same site shows Man U's net spend in the last five years as £282,700,000, and Spurs at -£12,850,000.
