Thunderhead
Full Member
- Joined
- Nov 2, 2016
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- 3,156
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- City
They spend well now because their insane wealth has bought them the luxury of being able to take plenty of shots in the early years, move on from failed transfers quickly with a really high turnover of players and then eventually settle on a really strong squad which only needs one or two additions each year.
You look at their recruitment now and it's all very calm and calculated and generally they buy well - but look at the first 7/8 years...I could list you 20+ horrible transfers that would have been a major problem for any other club, but not City because they can just write them off and move on.
I have shown many times that the real advantage the oil clubs have is being able to spend 4 or 5 times the market average across two or three windows. Both Chelsea and City did this and you can see Newcastle are starting to do it now. It allows them to build good squads very quickly, addressing several positions at once, whilst even very rich clubs like United or Real Madrid have to work to a budget.
United do spend insane money and we spend it very badly, but just to go back to us as an example...when we make a big-money transfer that doesn't work (i.e. Aaron Wan Bissaka) we are stuck with that player until either someone buys them and we take a loss or we coach them to do better. For comparison, just look how many full backs and centre backs City burnt through to settle on their current back four.
So it's a subject I find interesting. Yes, historical 'big' clubs with big budgets can spend large sums...but the biggest advantage of all is not having to work to any kind of budget and being able to 'fail fast'. It's the same in business, for what it's worth. Companies who can move on quickly from failed investments/projects/initiatives have an advantage.
I always laugh at the full back arguments, since 2009 we've signed 11 full backs and for a grand total of £230m, for central defenders we've signed about 11 since 2009 for about £350m, I wouldn't say that's excessive, £600m on defenders in 13 years, and there has only been Managala and Mendy who haven't really worked out who we never sold on and letting Savic go for free was always a mystery, so I wouldn't say we've bough loads and just let them rot because we can afford too.
João Cancelo £58m - decent
Angeliño - £10m - buy back made a profit on sale
Pedro Porro £10m - never played but looks a great talent, don't think we lost anything on the deal
Benjamin Mendy - £50 - urgh, looked great first few games till he did his knee, but awful human so good riddance
Kyle Walker - £50 - great signing
Danilo - £27m - ok, made a profit on the deal to bring in Cancelo
Bacary Sagna - Free - decent
Maicon £3.5m - woeful but meh
Gaël Clichy - £7m - decent
Aleksandar Kolarov - £21m - decent
Sylvinho - Free - short term freebie
Dias - 60m - decent
Ake £40m - decent, I wouldn't sell him but if he goes we haven't lost anything on the deal to Chelsea
Laporte - £60m - decent
Stones £50m - decent
Otamendi £40m - decent but slighlty overpayed but still played a good 4 seasons
Managala - £40m - Woeful
Demichelis - £5m - decent short term transfer
Nastatic £14m - sold for about 9m so nothing lost in the scheme of things
Savic £10m - no idea why we let him go for free after 1 season
Boetang £11m - duff but didn't lose money
Lescott £25m - decent at the time