I think from the clubs point of view the Mourinho experience was a big learning curve for them and since then the structure of the club has been changing. Especially regarding transfers and I can't really see anything wrong with that. Gone (I hope) are the days of signing mercenaries like Di Maria. Instead we're focusing on players who want to be here and not just for the
fat pay cheques (Sanchez) although obviously that helps.
I don't see any correlation with signing young players with resale value because we don't sell anybody. Quite the opposite in fact. We may take punts on players like James or Pereira but I don't think anyone can say we buy them to make a profit on them. I will agree with you about signing older players for shirt sales but I think any team would benefit from having players like Ronaldo, Cavani or Zlatan in their side. Hopefully we've learnt to stay away from players like Schweinsteiger and Falcao who were finished at a higher level.
I think we've had plenty of opportunities to get rid of players like Bailly but the club don't want to sell and I think we could all name 10 other players in a similar situation so I don't think it's any sort of business model from the club. Basically it boils down to us being useless in selling on players. I do agree there was a battle between Jose and the club in the transfer market but once again I'll say the club were right not to let Jose get his way. I think most are in agreement with this.
I have to say I'm from Belfast and I've never heard that saying
I really don't know what to make of the CM position. I'm at a loss for words. We can all speculate but if Ole is strengthening in all other areas of the pitch less the CM common sense says he thinks it's the area that needs less attention which would be very worrying in itself. Once again I can't see anything wrong with signing Bellingham types. We know he's not being bought only for us to sell him on at a profit. My biggest gripe is not signing them before they go to other clubs and then we have to pay premium value but would you really complain too much if Rice is valued at 90m and we don't buy him? We may be one of the richest clubs in the world but paying top notch for every position isn't the way to go. Especially if the player isn't worth the money.