Not sure the relevance of this, but because you set 150 as the games target, it missed out the likes of Shaw, Walcott, Bale and Chamberlain who certainly paid back more than what was invested in them.
The original poster has a point........Back in the 60's and 70's and probably the 80's as well most top teams bought a maximum of one or two players over a season. Even then it was only because they had sold a player and needed to replace him. Prior to the 60's transfers were very rare. The hubbub you see today was brought about by footballs insistence on having two transfer periods over a season. Nowadays it seems that teams in the top flight at least, dam near buy a whole new team during the summer period!!! I know I exaggerate, but 9 players as some have brought in, that is nearly a full team. How many players did we get rid of and bring in? It beggars belief as to what is happening on the transfer front today and yes we are lucky we have a good academy and have done for years. Without it we would have been rubbing shoulders with our near neighbours in the lower echelons of the football league.
I can understand in some ways why lower division teams have such a high turnover because they cannot offer long contracts, however in higher divisions especially the Premier League the issue is with risk taking. That is why so few young defenders or goalkeepers get a chance as people will not risk observing how a youth player will react as there is too much money at risk, hence Man U's spending spree.
And no-one spent anything at all in the SPL all through the window (unless a last minute one crept in.) The PL should follow that model IMO. Much better.
There was a surprisingly interesting(at times) debate on 5 live sport this evening from three fleet street hacks in relation to the transfer window and England team. It was between Sean Custus of the Sun, Neil Ashton of the Mail and Henry Winter of the telegraph. It was Sean Custus which made the good point that clubs should be stopped from Farming talent in response to Chelsea loaning out 26 players this window. Sadly the radio debate got sabotaged by the notion that they could be influencing other results and not the real issue of players getting lost in the system and not becoming part of a team and a club that values them as people. Chelsea treat their players as commodities and it's little wonder that they act as commodities or mercenaries. Sadly teams like Chelsea are becoming more common
Too early to say, but the upheaval this summer may yet turn out to be an opportunity rather than the disaster it appeared. It's some improvement that that could even cross my mind.
