‘No value in the market’ - 2026

I feel this window was a real chance for us to kick on but so far I don’t think our signings improve us much compared to last year.

Hopefully the back end of window leads to a few more quality signings.
 
Historically if we are in the champions league we do the bare minimum in the transfer window.

This then sets us back and we rinse and repeat the same cycle.

Its looking it'll go that way again
 
Highfather_24 said:
We agree on that, but I reach a different conclusion, as I believe that makes it much more important not to cheap out this summer.

A midfielder and left back are non negotiable in my opinion. And I see no footballing reasons as to why we should be compromising on quality either.

If you are not able to spend the big bucks, let the scouts earn their money.
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Definitely need a left back (or a LW, if Dorgu gets moved to LB which it doesn't look like he will). I'm a bit split on the last midfielder. Mount being part of the midfield rotation as one of the 4 makes sense to me and that's a decent midfield. You can't just ignore that he exists, and yes he has unreliable fitness but he's on the books so you gotta take a bit of a risk there I think. The other 3 are pretty reliable fitness wise anyway and between the 4 of them, it's a similar enough level that there shouldn't be any reason we overly rely on one player.

If I'm looking at our squad right now, honestly the position that worries me the most is CB. I think we'll quickly get to a situation where we are starting both Heaven and Yoro as our partnership while waiting for others to recover, and that's not a good thing. Both promising, neither ready to be key starters. But again we have 5 players there so you have to sell to buy, so I don't think that'll happen. Lewis Hall coming in would round out the squad pretty well, with the obvious risks of CB fitness, Mount fitness as one of the 4 options in CM, and what Rashford we get back. Could all go very well, could all implode. But we have them all on our books so we have to use them unless we manage to sell any of them.
 
NotChatGPT said:
But how much we have spent isnt related to qualifying or not.
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It’s all merely a huge coincidence

What does the data tell us? We spend reactively to CL qualification.

The stats when we’ve not qualified our spend pattern in relation to the previous season is:

+444%
+41.8%
+94.6%
+69.4%
+4%
+17.1%

The times when we’ve qualified our spend pattern in relation to the previous season is:

-25.2%
-10.3%
-47.1%
-60.4%
+112.3%
-15%
(current spend this season) -56.1%

After every season without Champions League (2014, 2016, 2019, 2022, 2024, 2025), we spent £144m–£212m, whereas after qualifying we spend far less (e.g. £27m, £57m, £74m, £93m). It lends weight to the argument that the club has repeatedly spent reactively after failure rather than building proactively from positions of strength.

The pattern is clear to see. The owners objective is CL football. Anything more would be an unlikely bonus.
 
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NotChatGPT said:
But how much we have spent isnt related to qualifying or not.
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Are you doing a "correlation doesnt imply causation" bit? Or is this just insane goal post shifting?

Because you said its a myth, and I literally showed you it isnt a myth. Go argue with a wall now.
 
bosnian_red said:
Definitely need a left back (or a LW, if Dorgu gets moved to LB which it doesn't look like he will). I'm a bit split on the last midfielder. Mount being part of the midfield rotation as one of the 4 makes sense to me and that's a decent midfield. You can't just ignore that he exists, and yes he has unreliable fitness but he's on the books so you gotta take a bit of a risk there I think.
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Hmm, but I would say its fine to have 6 midfielders for 3 positions. We have 5.

Bruno always plays, and Mount is injury prone, so that cancels each other out imo. They are fine for the #10 spot. We still need one more for the deeper position.
 
Highfather_24 said:
Are you doing a "correlation doesnt imply causation" bit? Or is this just insane goal post shifting?

Because you said its a myth, and I literally showed you it isnt a myth. Go argue with a wall now.
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Our transfer fees are factual. The narrative that we ignore squad investments every time we qualify for the CL is nonsense.
 
ron86 said:
We have Shaw who is incredibly injury prone coupled with a lot more games this year. Dorgus best posotion is as a wide man not a fb and Amass has done nothing at this level while also being linked with a move away for a nominal fee
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Yes, there are still 3 on the books receiving a wage.

Dorgu can play there, he never really had much time playing there for us. We have 2 LW in the form of Cunha and Rashford... and 2 on the RW. If he wants game time, I'm sure he would be happy to play LB too.
sp_cgb said:
As said in the other thread; The Glazers just got 1.25b for some of their shares. Put that back into the club for once and it easily pays for the stadium and some.

Or finally f*ck off. That would be even better.
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They put the club in this position...
 
ron86 said:
You should always have a valuation of a player and stay within a range of that. The issue becomes when your valuations start being consistently short of what the players you want to sign go for. At that point you either reliase you're values are too cheap in the current market for players and you increase them or you start shopping at a tier below that where you can sign players within that range, which is what we will do
Click to expand...

No that’s wrong. If your valuations are leading to missing out on securing the deal you dont just instantly accept your valuations are wrong or out of line with new market realities. That would be crazy. You instead consider whether the final prices of those assets are reflective or a new reality, or are themselves inflated. Since we managed to get decent prices for both Santos and Tielemans and Tottenham are buying from a point of uncommon desperation, I’d say that M Fernandez is overvalued at 85 and 200k/week. We may have to revise our valuations up slightly - that is football inflation after all - but to say “oh that’s how much a 21 year old mf prospect is now, so just pay it” - is, respectfully, total horseshit, and represents the kind of panicked, emotionally lead decision making that lead us to the financial constrained position we are now - see Anthony, Sancho VDB and so on.

Management are working sensibly this summer. I think they are now wanting to see how well Mount works in MF over a bigger sample of games to determine whether they prioritise a left back first. I think they’re comfortable enough with what we have so far to road test the squad in the first few pl games, leaving themselves some room to adjust and chase market opportunities as the window closes. They’re being patient - is a good thing.
 
ron86 said:
You should always have a valuation of a player and stay within a range of that. The issue becomes when your valuations start being consistently short of what the players you want to sign go for. At that point you either reliase you're values are too cheap in the current market for players and you increase them or you start shopping at a tier below that where you can sign players within that range, which is what we will do
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Has it actually happened?
 
Highfather_24 said:
What? That's exactly what that is. How much we have spent when we qualify for CL vs when we dont.
Click to expand...

If you're comparing what we spent missing the CL in 2013 to what we spent missing the CL in 2025 the maths isn't going to math is it

Also as someone else pointed out 40% of transfers get done in the last 25% of the window or something like there is still time left, if at the end of the window we haven't made more moves sure questions will be asked, it also should be noted due to our relatively easy start to the league I am not sure there is a lot of urgency to get deals over the line.
 
Highfather_24 said:
Hmm, but I would say its fine to have 6 midfielders for 3 positions. We have 5.

Bruno always plays, and Mount is injury prone, so that cancels each other out imo. They are fine for the #10 spot. We still need one more for the deeper position.
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Think for the backup 10 you have Zirkzee or Lacey right now, with Rashford the backup #9. So it's still 2 per position plus a youth player as an extra attacker in Lacey
 
The biggest thing for me, is every fan even the ones who try to be as positive as can be, all acknowledged at the beginning of the summer that we didn't have the squad depth to compete in all competitions. We haven't done that. We're running the same squad size with Casemiro gone and Ugarte out for the season by replacing them with Santos and Tielemans. All we've done is potentially add Rashford to the squad who plays in the one area that funny enough we didn't need.

The biggest problem is next summer is going to be another pivotal one because we'll have to make decisions on Maguire, De Ligt, Martinez, Shaw and Mount. Which means we may NEED 2 CB's, 1 LB and 1 Midfielder. Then there's the huge elephant in the room about how long Bruno Fernandes can keep his high standards because he's not getting any younger.
 
sp_cgb said:
Ask the CEO. He gave the interview, not me.

And who cares about M.Fernandes at this point? Pulling out of that deal was never the issue. The people in charge not doing enough and blaming it on unfortunate external circumstances will though. If that's what we resort to at the end of this window.

So yes, let's hope they're not done yet.
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The people in charge put us in relatively safe position to start the season. Whoever we buy now is not going to seriously change the starting XI for the opening games, I don't think. This is why I am fairly relaxed about this window still, and I am confident everyone from Carrick up to the CEO knows we're probably not finishing in top 4 with that squad. So, there will be transfers I'm sure.

Also I never for a second considered Tchouameni coming to United as a possibility, so my expectations are rather tempered for this window. Again, I am pretty sure we know the starting XI for the opening games. We will probably add some depth but nothing fancy.
Hall is the only one who if we can get him then probably takes over from Shaw in the first few months.
 
Snormac said:
No that’s wrong. If your valuations are leading to missing out on securing the deal you dont just instantly accept your valuations are wrong or out of line with new market realities. That would be crazy. You instead consider whether the final prices of those assets are reflective or a new reality, or are themselves inflated. Since we managed to get decent prices for both Santos and Tielemans and Tottenham are buying from a point of uncommon desperation, I’d say that M Fernandez is overvalued at 85 and 200k/week. We may have to revise our valuations up slightly - that is football inflation after all - but to say “oh that’s how much a 21 year old mf prospect is now, so just pay it” - is, respectfully, total horseshit, and represents the kind of panicked, emotionally lead decision making that lead us to the financial constrained position we are now - see Anthony, Sancho VDB and so on.

Management are working sensibly this summer. I think they are now wanting to see how well Mount works in MF over a bigger sample of games to determine whether they prioritise a left back first. I think they’re comfortable enough with what we have so far to road test the squad in the first few pl games, leaving themselves some room to adjust and chase market opportunities as the window closes. They’re being patient - is a good thing.
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The PL is in a bubble at the moment, so this is a dreadful time to buy. We don't know quite how long it will last, but given that there's only about 10 teams in the world that can afford to buy someone like Anderson or Rogers, (and two of them, PSG and Bayern, have opted out of that kind of transfer) I would argue prices at that range are unsustainable. If you buy a player at £120M and they flop, you either pay that price for years to come, or sell them at a painful accounting loss.

Unfortunately we still do need to find players who can fit certain gaps, so I don't think we can just sit back and wait it out. But we need to be extremely canny if we're not to end up struggling in the coming season. Fuelling the fire isn't the answer.
 
Roboc7 said:
I think we might sign one player over that amount but not by much, maybe our biggest fee will be 60m give or take.

Still expect a CM and LB to be signed but who knows, I’d say we are working out which one of we commit the majority of funds to, depending on who is available.

The prospect of not being able to sell any of Onana, Rashford, Ugarte and Zirkzee now seems almost inevitable and has obviously the restricted the budget even more.
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That's how I see this as well. The fact we can't get any player out the door makes it difficult to even plan next moves.

I still think we will get a LB and CM but increasingly likely backup options that most fans will consider uninspiring.

The bigger problem I see is: imagine we do cash in on Rashford and Zirkzee. So we have another 60m available. Are we getting another DM/defensive 8 that is better than Santos? I don't think so. This is why I think Hall is the last chance for a big money transfer this season. And again, don't see it hapenning because of Newcastle situation.

We've spent badly in the last years (especially before Ineos), but this year all circumstances are conspiring against us.
 
Red4Life_#7 said:
Yes, there are still 3 on the books receiving a wage
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Dorgu is receiving a wage as an attacking option which he will provide and may be lb in an emergency. Amass is off. The point is we want good options, you can't just say we don't need the sign players as people can fill in, that works at Ipswich, not a top side
 
Snormac said:
Management are working sensibly this summer. I think they are now wanting to see how well Mount works in MF over a bigger sample of games to determine whether they prioritise a left back first. I think they’re comfortable enough with what we have so far to road test the squad in the first few pl games, leaving themselves some room to adjust and chase market opportunities as the window closes. They’re being patient - is a good thing.
Click to expand...
What bigger sample of games? More pre-season friendlies? We only have 2 competitive games in this window. If you're trying to argue that's its good management to use pre season as a gauge to whether we can use Mason Mount who has been shown to be crock instead of buying someone we will have to disagree massively. That's dreadful management. So say mount is injured or crap against Hull and ipswich. What then? They panic and overpay for whoever they can get on deadline day ? They knew our squad, knew our weaknesses, pre season should have no impact on that
 
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Surely there are good players out there who would improve our squad and just as surely they wouldn’t necessarily cost a ludicrous amount of money.

We still absolutely need a quality number 6 as well as a left back and another option up front.

Losing Casemiro is a problem just from his attacking presence which as good as Tielemans is, and hopefully Santos too, we don’t seem to have improved our firepower this summer so far - which will be crucial in terms of improving, or even just consolidating our place in the top three.
 
ron86 said:
What bigger sample of games? More pre-season friendlies? We only have 2 competitive games in this window. If you're trying to argue that's its good management to use pre season as a gauge to whether we can use Mason Mount who has been shown to be crock instead of buying someone we will have to disagree massively. That's dreadful management. So say mount is injured or crap against Hull and ipswich. What then? They panic and overpay for whoever they can get on deadline day ? They knew our squad, knew our weaknesses, pre season should have no impact on that
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I didn’t say they shouldn’t buy someone (in fact i have been and still am a strong advocate for getting more legs in there) - I said they may prioritise elsewhere. So say Mount isn’t holding his own, you go all out for Tchou, and get that Spanish left back for peanuts. But instead Mount looks like he could do a job there? Then you splurge the 70 on Hall/MLS and get Berge instead. A tough call, huge stakes - I would think you’d want as much information as possible to inform the decision, even it is is just Mount making it through another 2-3 90 minutes.
 
Reds Under The Bed said:
Surely there are good players out there who would improve our squad and just as surely they wouldn’t necessarily cost a ludicrous amount of money.

We still absolutely need a quality number 6 as well as a left back and another option up front.

Losing Casemiro is a problem just from his attacking presence which as good as Tielemans is, and hopefully Santos too, we don’t seem to have improved our firepower this summer so far - which will be crucial in terms of improving, or even just consolidating our place in the top three.
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I still think we have 2 signings left, not breaking the bank but to still improve us. I've said before that santos and tielemans are good signings at good prices but I refuse to believe we will be starting next season without either properly improving our first 11 or adding good depth now we have CL
 
I think two things have happened, first of - new rules. the SCR rule came in, and as I have understood it, it also comes with a bit of grace period meaning that teams can spend a lot more, but are also not pressured to sell as under the FSR. This has meant that valuations have shoot up as there is more money out there, and no need for smaller teams to really sell. Hopefully the rules will get more bite in the coming seasons. Our issue though was not being compliant with the rules, but our cash position that has been weak.

Secondly, we probably spent £60-100m on the new land for the stadium. While that is an asset, from a cash that is pure outflow. Finally, on cash, we had to pay about £200m this summer for old transfers, which ones again makes our cash position rather weak. I still believe we are willing to invest in the right deals, but currently those are hard to get - but by the looks of it we did manage two great deals.

From a squad point of view, we have lost 2 players (Cas, and Ugarte to injury), which we have replaced. We have also gained in my mind 2 new squad players in Rashford and Lacey, meaning that we do have good depth up front, but may lack a true number 9 backup. Would like to see us do a goood deal for another midfielder (can be 5th choice) and starting quality LB but lets see.
 
Snormac said:
I didn’t say they shouldn’t buy someone (in fact i have been and still am a strong advocate for getting more legs in there) - I said they may prioritise elsewhere. So say Mount isn’t holding his own, you go all out for Tchou, and get that Spanish left back for peanuts. But instead Mount looks like he could do a job there? Then you splurge the 70 on Hall/MLS and get Berge instead. A tough call, huge stakes - I would think you’d want as much information as possible to inform the decision, even it is is just Mount making it through another 2-3 90 minutes.
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My point is how does Mount look like he can do a job there? The sample size isn't big enough compared to the sample size of him being out for half the season. We need to make these decisions now, you can't wait to play hull and ipswich then make a deciosn on whether you want to go big on mf or lb. That's the final day of the window, we would be abolsutely rinsed on the fee for either of them that late
 
michelleOntaRio-Rio said:
It’s all merely a huge coincidence

What does the data tell us? We spend reactively to CL qualification.

The stats when we’ve not qualified our spend pattern in relation to the previous season is:

+444%
+41.8%
+94.6%
+69.4%
+4%
+17.1%

The times when we’ve qualified our spend pattern in relation to the previous season is:

-25.2%
-10.3%
-47.1%
-60.4%
+112.3%
-15%
(current spend this season) -56.1%

After every season without Champions League (2014, 2016, 2019, 2022, 2024, 2025), we spent £144m–£212m, whereas after qualifying we spend far less (e.g. £27m, £57m, £74m, £93m). It lends weight to the argument that the club has repeatedly spent reactively after failure rather than building proactively from positions of strength.

The pattern is clear to see. The owners objective is CL football. Anything more would be an unlikely bonus.
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Including @ron86

People just like simple answers, that’s about it, and look at the easy things rather than looking at what’s behind it.

Up until the ownership changes and changes to our overall structure, we’ve allowed the manager to dictate our transfers, that needs to be taken into account at the same time as you take into account the squad. How many players did we try to sign on a manager request. Nor does it even take into account free transfers and wages.

Moyes took over in 13-14, our lack of spending had nothing to do with qualifying for the CL ahead of it, and everything to do with Moyes insisting on players that either weren’t interested in us or not interested in leaving at all (Bale, Fabregas, the duo bid for Fellaini and Baines)

We then failed to qualify for the CL for the 14-15 season, Moyes got sacked and Van Gaal comes in. We spent €195mill (Shaw and Herrera had already been lined while Moyes was still there, that accounts for €70mill). We qualify for the CL, spent €160mill and also chased after Muller hoping he’d leave Bayern (that would’ve been cheap).

We then failed to qualify for the CL, sacked Van Gaal and hired Mourinho, spent €185mill on players Mourinho wanted. Qualified for the CL via EL, spent €200mill on players Mourinho wanted, including sending a Mourinho signing to Arsenal + a hefty fee and turning Sanchez into the best paid player in the world only for him to turn out to be an absolute disaster signing. Qualified for the CL via the league. Mourinho was on the decline, wanted to pretty much replace all the players we had spent the odd €385mill on signing, wanted to bring in a player now valued at over €100mill that was available for feck all when we spent a fortune on Bailly and Lindelof. We approached Leicester for Maguire, they quoted a league record fee and the player wasn’t even that keen at the time, there was nothing to work with. We spent very little.

Ole comes in, instantly does better with the very same squad that Mourinho wanted to completely replace. We still don’t qualify for the CL. Spend €236mill. Qualify for the CL. Spend €90mill, including Cavani on a free transfer (not cheap). We desperately tried to sign Sancho, but Dortmund weren’t interested in budging, the decision was made that Sancho was a key player to bring in and that we’d rather wait to get him than get someone else. Qualified for the CL, spent the odd €142mill, which was Sancho for a massive fee and Varane and Ronaldo (neither on cheap wages)

And so on. there is nothing indicating that the club cut back on spending simply because we qualified for the CL
 
ron86 said:
My point is how does Mount look like he can do a job there? The sample size isn't big enough compared to the sample size of him being out for half the season. We need to make these decisions now, you can't wait to play hull and ipswich then make a deciosn on whether you want to go big on mf or lb. That's the final day of the window, we would be abolsutely rinsed on the fee for either of them that late
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If there is one thing we can be sure of it’s that Mount cannot be relied upon simply because his fitness record is appalling.

Likewise with Martinez and De Ligt at the back as well as Mazroeui. We need continuity in key positions.

How many centre back pairings alone did we have in recent years because De Ligt and Martinez are so often injured?
 
Highfather_24 said:
What? That's exactly what that is. How much we have spent when we qualify for CL vs when we dont.
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Haha. When people can’t admit they’re wrong.

Opinions are fine but there’s really no comeback to your previous post clearly showcasing the difference.

And yet they still tried. Deary me
 
ron86 said:
But hes shown you stats that with correlate with that
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But no.

The numbers themselves don’t indicate if there’s any truth to the narrative that we invest heavily while outside the CL and hit the brakes when we do qualify, and it’s not like the numbers are drastically lower when we do qualify. Not that it matters, because there are perfectly good reasons behind our spending in the seasons we’re talking about. With Mourinho you could even argue that after spending the odd €400mill (and we spent more in the second window after qualifying for CL) on 8 first team players, including Zlatan on a «free»,it’s obviously going to impact both the need and room to spend heavily in a third window. Just like you can look at most clubs, including the ones competing for trophies, and see that it’s not a constant increase every fecking season.

Not to mention that it matters even less, as we’re essentially under new management with Ineos and comparing what we did 13 years ago is fecking silly. Maybe that’s the direction INEOS will take.
 
But the post shows exactly that the initial statement made “we spend less when we qualify for the UCL post SAF versus when we don’t qualify” as factual?

Like literally, on average we spend £74m pounds more (£174m versus £100m on average). The data is right there. How you want to interpret the data is whole other argument and up for discussion and context but the initial statement was not a “myth”.

I’m actually hopeful Ineos will do “better”, so let’s see.
 
The bottom line is everyone expected Anderson/Tchouameni/Fernandes/Tonali/Bruno G/Sangare

We ended up with Santos, Tielemans and a big "Mason Mount is a top top player".
 
This thread should be titled "McDonalds", because I'm lovin' it!
 
Highfather_24 said:
I find it funny that people think we will make 3 more signings, and it will be the likes of Tchouameni and Hall.

Kone/Berg + backup striker, and I think that's that for this window.

There's some that think we will either get a marquee midfield signing or Hall, but not both. I'm almost 90% sure that we will get neither. But there's no reason why we cant afford a top class midfielder AND Hall.

Its just that they are just not looking to spend money because we already qualified for CL. Its a pattern, and I think its a shame we gave Amorim a much higher budget than Carrick.
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Right now I would be over the moon with one of those and either a backup striker or a LB, I'm desperate
 
manutddjw said:
The biggest thing for me, is every fan even the ones who try to be as positive as can be, all acknowledged at the beginning of the summer that we didn't have the squad depth to compete in all competitions. We haven't done that. We're running the same squad size with Casemiro gone and Ugarte out for the season by replacing them with Santos and Tielemans. All we've done is potentially add Rashford to the squad who plays in the one area that funny enough we didn't need.

The biggest problem is next summer is going to be another pivotal one because we'll have to make decisions on Maguire, De Ligt, Martinez, Shaw and Mount. Which means we may NEED 2 CB's, 1 LB and 1 Midfielder. Then there's the huge elephant in the room about how long Bruno Fernandes can keep his high standards because he's not getting any younger.
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Feel like Gibbs-White might be the guy we are earmarking to take over from Bruno next summer. I know people often mention Palmer with him supporting Utd as a kid. However I expect the asking price to be way out of INEOS range.
 
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