Did Fergie lose his touch in the transfer market?

[Brophs]

Inspired by something Pogue said the other day and what others have said recently. We all know that Fergie has picked up some absolute gems for the club, but in the later years did the number of misses start to rise sharply? Obviously there are arguments to be made as regards the diminishing returns being down to a lack of resources, or the oil clubs coming in and skewing the market.

And, before I get any snarky replies, I'm not saying Fergie was anything other than a great manager who had us consistently overachieving. This is really just about whether a (relatively) low success rate in the transfer market had crept in, much of which was covered by the players he had at the club - many of whom he had brought through as young players - and his overall managerial brilliance. I find it pretty interesting that even when we were having mixed success in the market, we were still flying on the pitch, for the most part.

I've mainly taken the fees from http://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/manchester-united/alletransfers/verein/985 so if they're wrong, that's why.

I've bolded the players I think have been success to-date. I've put the ones I think either are likely to be successful, or it's too early to judge, in red. I've put the ones that were decent business overall without being massive successes here in blue and the rest I think were poor buys. I've judged them on the basis of what we paid, what was expected of them and how they've done. For example, I'm no great fan of Lindegaard, but for the price we paid, he's done a reasonably fine job when called upon and provides decent cover to DdG, so I've stuck him in blue. Likewise PIG, even though he's utter shite. Similarly as we brought in Foster for a much smaller fee and sold him for a higher price and with international caps under his belt, I've done the same. Basically if they didn't do too much damage on the pitch and didn't lose us much money, I've put them in blue.

2012/2013
RvP - £24m
Kagawa - £14m
Zaha - £15m
Powell - £6m
Henriquez - £4m
Buttner - £4m

2011/2012
DDG - £18m
Jones - £17m
Young - £15m

2010/2011
Bebe - £7m
Smalling £12m
Chicharito - £7m
Lindegaard - £4m

2009/2010
Valencia - £16m
Diouf - £4m
Obertan £3m
Owen - Free

2008/2009
Berba - £28m
Tosic - £7m
De Laet - Free
Fabio - £?
Rafael- £?

2007/2008
Anderson £27m
Nani - £22m
Hargreaves - £18m
Tevez - Loan
PIG - £2.5m
Possebon - ?
Manucho - £500k

2006/2007
Carrick - £18m
Larsson - Loan

2005/2006
Vidic - £7m
Evra - £7m
Park - £4m
VdS - £2.5m
Foster - £2m

2004/2005
Rooney - £27m
Heinze - £7m
Smith - £6m
Pique - ?
Miller - Free

To me it looks like we had a good few years between 2004 & 2007. Then in 2007/2008 we went on that big splurge, most of whom have proven to be underwhelming to differing degrees. After that for a couple of seasons the only really good signing that has made an immediate, consistent and significant impact was Valencia, when you consider what we paid for Berba and how it ended up. I'd probably argue that in his last three seasons he looked to be warming to the task again, as in 2010/2011 Chicharito was a great bit of business, Smalling has shown massive potential, albeit had a poor season this time around and Lindegaard has given us solid back up in goal. In 2011/2012 DDG was a great signing and Jones will hopefully prove to be one too (he might be our best ever player!!). 2012/2013 he got RvP who was an inspired signing and Kagawa who, IMHO, has been underwhelming thus far. Beyond that Zaha and Powell will hopefully be really good signings for us. Henriquez is a bit more of an unknown.

Obviously the other thing that hasn't been discussed is the transfers he didn't do i.e. the midfield. Whether that was a genuine blind spot I doubt we'll ever know but I think it goes without saying that we could and should have better options available to us right now.

So what say ye? Is his a normal hit/miss ratio for a manager at a big club, or did he slightly lose his way in the market?

 

[2 man midfield]

I don't think so. I think he definitely, with the exception of van Persie, put most of his effort into signing young players to aid his successor. Most of whom can't be decided upon one way or another yet. Had he gone for a few more top quality players as before it's likely we'd have seen them become a success quicker. Saying that, he's had a few duds on both sides of that fence.

 

[kouroux]

We rested too much on our laurels by trying to go for cheap players and not expensive ones.

 

[RustyS]

Feckin hell. Anderson - 27m. It hurts to read that. 27m adjusted to today's prices would be something outrageous.

To the question in the OP, as you said, there is a lot of variables so it is hard to pin the pattern on SAF. One could argue that our club as a whole has not adjusted well to the rapid changes in how things are done in the transfer market. I'm hesitant to get into stuff like this though because we don't know everything that goes on behind the scene when it comes to transfer negotiations.

 

[Mick1991]

It sounds a little harsh, but it looks a bit scattergun in regards to the signings.

Lots of money, not a whole lot of quality. Could be argued that the Glazers approach didn't really help (I'm pretty sure the mantra was buy young potential that we could recoup some money on if they decided to leave, backing potential is always a gamble)

It's tough to criticise him, because chances are he would have this side (with some more signings) competing at the top regularly. He was a genius, it only really dawned on me during the Moyes reign just how tough it was going to be to replace him, almost impossible.

 

[Ringo 07]

2 things happened....in 2011 fergie said that the fa youth cup winning team of that year were as good as the class of 92....fergie had very high hopes to build his last great team with the core from that squad....I'm sure he believed morrison and pogba were certainties to make the first team and that maybe lingard, and the two keane brothers might make the first team too....even gaz neville said at the time that maybe 5 could make the first team eventually.....fergie was planning 5 years ahead as usual...but destiny was not going to let him have a class of 92 for a second era and everything went tits up with that great youth team of 2011

Secondly in 99 when we won the champions league we were in the top 3 clubs in europe probably in terms of the salary we could offer to attract the biggest names......but since then petro dollars have flooded the football world and we don't even come close to having the spending power on wages as the likes of city, monaco,chelsea and psg have...fergie realized that attracting the biggest names in europe was becoming almost imposdible so I think he changed his strategy to try and sign up and coming players like nani, vidic, anderson and evra and hoped they could eventually become stars...sometimes it worked...sometimes it didnt but it saved the club a fortune and kept our finances in a very healthy position as we continued to dominate but it also gave all of our petro dolar rivals a chance to catch up and even overtake us....appointing his great friend and a dour awful manager in moyes has not helped the situation....but if lvg is the right man then hopefully the club can get brilliant up and coming players like liverpool have been focusing on and get us back on the right track

 

[Raoul]

Even if certain players never developed to levels we may have hoped, when viewed in totality over the past decade - Fergie's transfers have been quite good and have yielded something five leagues and three CL finals, with the backbone of players like Evra, Vidic, Nani, Carrick, Rooney, and Hernandez - that's not including the likes of Tevez and RvP who were instrumental in league wins and in Tevez's case in the CL winning year.

 

[NMF]

Not many players on that list can be considered successful signings. There is also a lack of established players from other European leagues, I wonder if SAF started playing it safe in the market after some of our more expensive foreign imports flopped and just stuck to buying established players within the league, either way it's a reason for a decline in quality in our squad.

 

[Vidic_In_Moscow]

For me, the Ashley Young signing was the most bizarre, and the most indicative of the then-current situation at the club.

 

[stevoc]

2007/2008
Anderson £27m
Nani - £22m
Hargreaves - £18m
Tevez - Loan
PIG - £2.5m
Possebon - ?
Manucho - £500k

Anderson never cost £27m, jesus christ don't know how many times ive read this over the years it must be one of the biggest myths in football. People have said he cost as much as £30m at times. We bought him for €30 million which in 2007 worked out about £18 million if i remember correctly.

Granted thats still a lot of money for the player he turned out to be but lets get it right.

 

[stevoc]

2 things happened....in 2011 fergie said that the fa youth cup winning team of that year were as good as the class of 92....fergie had very high hopes to build his last great team with the core from that squad....I'm sure he believed morrison and pogba were certainties to make the first team and that maybe lingard, and the two keane brothers might make the first team too....even gaz neville said at the time that maybe 5 could make the first team eventually.....fergie was planning 5 years ahead as usual...but destiny was not going to let him have a class of 92 for a second era and everything went tits up with that great youth team of 2011

Secondly in 99 when we won the champions league we were in the top 3 clubs in europe probably in terms of the salary we could offer to attract the biggest names......but since then petro dollars have flooded the football world and we don't even come close to having the spending power on wages as the likes of city, monaco,chelsea and psg have...fergie realized that attracting the biggest names in europe was becoming almost imposdible so I think he changed his strategy to try and sign up and coming players like nani, vidic, anderson and evra and hoped they could eventually become stars...sometimes it worked...sometimes it didnt but it saved the club a fortune and kept our finances in a very healthy position as we continued to dominate but it also gave all of our petro dolar rivals a chance to catch up and even overtake us....appointing his great friend and a dour awful manager in moyes has not helped the situation....but if lvg is the right man then hopefully the club can get brilliant up and coming players like liverpool have been focusing on and get us back on the right track

I don't think that was the case to be honest well at least not in 1999, Keane didn't get his new £50k contract until 2001 (iirc) to break our wage structure before that we didn't have a player on more than £20-25k a week. After keanes new contract broke our wage structure we proceeded to sign RVN, Veron & Ferdinand in 2001 & 2002 we were undoubtedly top dogs in the transfer market in england but that didn't last long as roman came along in 2003 and blew us out of the water. And since then we have had to play second or third fiddle for players.

 

[pocco]

I think something was/is up with our transfer system these last few years. Moyes had issues with the setup and it's not really brought great results in recent times.

Fergie practically gave up on the 'punts' and started signing more established quantities such as RVP, Kagawa and De Gea. Whenever he strayed from this he got burnt, which indicates that someone wasn't up to task. I'm thinking about the likes of Obertan, Bebe etc. Even the likes of Hernandez, Buttner, perhaps Zaha aren't going to prove up to the standard required.

 

[Keeps It tidy]

No

 

[stevoc]

I think something was/is up with our transfer system these last few years. Moyes had issues with the setup and it's not really brought great results in recent times.

Fergie practically gave up on the 'punts' and started signing more established quantities such as RVP, Kagawa and De Gea. Whenever he strayed from this he got burnt, which indicates that someone wasn't up to task. I'm thinking about the likes of Obertan, Bebe etc. Even the likes of Hernandez, Buttner, perhaps Zaha aren't going to prove up to the standard required.

Hernandez & Buttner in the same sentence in terms of success really? Javier for what was it £7m has been a brilliant signing. While we are at it Zaha could still prove to be a good buy the kid wasn't given a chance by Moyes lets see how he does under LVG before writing him off.

 

[ThaReaper01]

De Laet being blue but Owen not is a bit odd. He was a pay-as-you-play signing and played a far bigger role in winning the league than De Laet ever did.

 

[birdy2121]

Looking at the list and taking into account we sold ronaldo for huge money. We spent relatively little compared to some of our rivals. Just goes to further enhance SAF reputation as a manager who could get so much out of any team he sent out onto the pitch. Total genius and much missed.

 

[Keeps It tidy]

Considering the season we just had without him at the helm you would think the nitpicking of his record would cease.

 

[Ekeke]

Yes. Sort of. Sir Alex spent less later on than you'd expect and he won with it like he knew he could. However if you look at how much we spent on plenty of the players it hasnt paid off. He was ultimately successful in spite of some dodgy signings rather than because of the ones he got right as he had developed such a good core of players to rely on over a long period.

 

[predator]

Selling Ronaldo (for 80million) looking back was a farce as was selling Tevez to City but thts about it. Apart from that he was absolutely sound regarding high profile transfer in the later years.

 

[devilish]

At a point we simply didn't want to tackle the big elephant in the room ie CM. I guess it was hard for SAF to confront homegrown talent Fletcher, Giggs, Scholes and Cleverley + lovely lad Ando and tell them that it was time for a change.

 

[NMF]

At a point we simply didn't want to tackle the big elephant in the room ie CM. I guess it was hard for SAF to confront homegrown talent Fletcher, Giggs, Scholes and Cleverley + lovely lad Ando and tell them that it was time for a change.

Do you think it was complacency? When you look at his signings particularly foreign players in midfield the majority have flopped or not worked out.

But even in recent years other than Thiago and Modric he didn't seem interested to sign anyone in this area, not even when players were moving on the cheap as well.

 

[Miscemayl]

As fans, we always want new signings, the bigger the name, the better. However it's a bit rough to look at that list and conclude SAF lost his mojo.

His team, even with the "duds" / lack of signings, won the league. SAF clearly had a team that he thought was good enough and they were. Not his fault someone else can't extract the same level of performance from them.

SAF had more to consider than just what's happening on the pitch. The financials mattered to the club and hence mattered to him. It's why he kept talking about value because he felt there were no players that could better the team at a reasonable price.

 

[Hamadovich86]

The club as a whole lost a lot of financial clout due to the debt and the arrival of the oil clubs inflating the market. It is clear that we are not competing at the highest level in the transfer market and we cannot (or are unwilling) to pay the crazy inflated fees to stay competitive. Sticking to the youth policy is great and we still managed to be successful but I believe this window is crucial and if we do not get the kind of players we need it would be difficult to challenge for even 4th.

 

[Bojan11]

Selling Ronaldo (for 80million) looking back was a farce as was selling Tevez to City but thts about it. Apart from that he was absolutely sound regarding high profile transfer in the later years.

We didn't sell Tevez.

Sadly Anderson and Nani haven't gone on to develop as the world class players they should have been. Smalling and Jones couldn't even displace Vidic and Rio in their last season. If those four had developed the way we expected then our team wouldn't look half bad.

Our transfer policy had been wrong. We should aim for proven world class and sign potential world class players. We should have mixed it up. Rather than just signing young players.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

I think the brilliance of Ronaldo made Fergie take his eye off the ball. He seemed intent on unearthing another un-polished gem and stopped buying the low-risk, top class talents that have been the basis of so much of our success.

There was never any doubt that the likes of Keane, Ferdinand and Rooney would be stars for United but that comes with a premium price. Fergie's always been a gambling man and obviously began favouring the long odds punts over the odds on favourites.

Of course, it didn't help matters that on the rare occasion he did buck this trend he backed wrong 'uns like Hargreaves and Berbatov. That would have made him even less likely to divert from his policy of shopping for "potential" rather than pedigree. That and the ludicrously inflated market thanks to all the willy-waving oligarchs.

 

[devilish]

Do you think it was complacency? When you look at his signings particularly foreign players in midfield the majority have flopped or not worked out.

But even in recent years other than Thiago and Modric he didn't seem interested to sign anyone in this area, not even when players were moving on the cheap as well.

I think that SAF mellowed a lot in his last years and couldn't bring himself in telling his beloved kids that it was time to pack and leave. He could get away with it because he still won EPL titles

 

[MDFC Manager]

Fergie was never consistently brilliant in the market. He had his hits and misses. In his later years he got idealistic about player valuations and decided to stick by that.

 

[Revan]

Posted something similarily yesterday on an another thread (athoug it was for United transfers, not SAF):

This. Originally we made a great team but after a few years our signings became bad and worse. Anderson, Young, Hargreaves, Berbatov and Fellaini were bad signings (not all equally bad but still). RVP and Valencia were good signings. De Gea was a great signing. Nani didn't run out that good and the same (until now) has happened to Kagawa. Jones and Smalling while can become good signing in the end, doesn't look like it now.

Our problem was that we went for bad players in the last few years. Mata cost only 3-5m higher than Young (with a significantly lower wage) for example. Dortmund made a team for less money than we signed Fellaini. etc etc

Exclude Fellaini who happened under Moyes, still the situation is almost the same. We have been very poor on market since Carrick signing (2006). There were some good players signed after (Valencia, DDG and RVP) and some gems (Hernandez) but the majority of signings have been either underwhelming (Nani, Kagawa), early to judge (Smalling, Jones - although someone can out them on underwhelming category) or failures (Ando, Hargreaves, Young).

 

[ghagua]

Ever since Fergie took over United, there have been hits and misses with the transfers. The hits have contributed to the success and the failures have been moved on quickly. I would not call Hargreaves, Nani and Anderson total failures, they contributed to the double we done in 2008 and scored those penalties in the Champion league finals. It should have been another treble, but for that stupid ref who allowed Portsmouth to win that FA cup tie at Old Trafford.

 

[Acole9]

All managers make bad signings. I think in the last few years SAF did appear reluctant to pay the high transfer fees that were being banded about for certain targets of ours which has affected us in a way.

 

[Lu Tze]

In his past 6/7 years his record was absolutely shocking. For all his purported priority on personality traits in signing players he didn't half sign some useless feckers.

 

[Zak Smith]

The Glazers didn't help matters, we missed out on top players because of a reluctance to pay the higher fees on a single player. Considering our financial position for a number of years now it's incredible that we've only just gone above £35m for a player, we should be capable of making huge signings like Barcelona and Real Madrid.

 

[NMF]

I think that SAF mellowed a lot in his last years and couldn't bring himself in telling his beloved kids that it was time to pack and leave. He could get away with it because he still won EPL titles

That's true, but it's also a good thing Van Gaal is here, his ruthless he won't keep Cleverley because his homegrown if a player isn't up to the standard they'll be shipped out that's how it should be with any top club.

 

[SirAF]

Anderson never cost £27m, jesus christ don't know how many times ive read this over the years it must be one of the biggest myths in football. People have said he cost as much as £30m at times. We bought him for €30 million which in 2007 worked out about £18 million if i remember correctly.

Granted thats still a lot of money for the player he turned out to be but lets get it right.

This. The great Anderson transfer fee myth.

 

[James Redburn]

Ferguson always threw enough at the fan knowing Utd's unparalleled resources could cope.

The British leagues were cherry picked with impunity right up to RVP proven Prem performers from every club bar liverpool were snaffled annually providing the backbone and foundations. His foreign buys had Real Madrid/Barca/Bayern in the frame and his hit rate was nowhere near as high.

Once others matched the financial clout of Utd in the Prem it wasn't so easy.

 

[Kayo]

From 2009 onwards god there is some crap in that list.

"Value".

 

[RedRover]

Ferguson always threw enough at the fan knowing Utd's unparalleled resources could cope.

The British leagues were cherry picked with impunity right up to RVP proven Prem performers from every club bar liverpool were snaffled annually providing the backbone and foundations. His foreign buys had Real Madrid/Barca/Bayern in the frame and his hit rate was nowhere near as high.

Once others matched the financial clout of Utd in the Prem it wasn't so easy.

Have to agree with that, especially the final point.

 

[RooneyLegend]

Of course Sir Alex lost the plot in the transfer market. That should be pretty obvious to everyone, and if it isn't then those that disagree need to learn how to be objective. In his latter years I really didn't like much of the decisions he made in the market. He basically lost his ruthlessness and fell into the trap of having too much belief in the squad we already had.

Selling Ronaldo, not signing tevez and then signing Valencia and owen must be some of the worst work I've seen anyone do. Letting our midfield decay by not signing any recognizable midfielders in eons also didn't help. Not signing any left back despite Evra's obvious decline since 2010. Keeping dead weight despite obvious need to sell. Keeping Berbaflop despite the obvious negative effect he was having on our system.

Seriously, the only significant things he's done in the market since 2010 is sign Van persie and DDG. Let's not forget that we got lucky that the opportunity to sign the former presented itself. Its honestly going to take some time to sort this mess out and hopefully Van Gaal is up to the task.

 

[goldenstatesplash]

What are the ages of the recent signigns in red?..

 

[arthurka]

Well the results tell us no....
But the state of the squad when he left tell us yes..

We paid alot for a bunch of mediocre players, but the core of the squad was very good. But he didnt replace some of our senior players, Scholes,Ferdinand,Carrick,Vidic,Evra.. But then again we would never have finished 7th with Fergie in charge. I dont know! He just signed the wrong manager..