Put a price on how much it would cost us to genuinely compete for the title

[Dominos]

Are we talking net spend because if we're willing to be ruthless, we can recoup a significant sum.

Out:
Martial - 25m
Sancho - 40m
Vdb - 15m
Mctom - 25m
Telles - 5m
Williams - 5m
Bailly - 8m
Maguire - 25m
Henderson - 25m
Dalot - 20m

173m

Every season we fantasise about raising loads of money with sales and it never happens, we end up stuck with players we wanted rid of for another year or we have to loan them because we can't find a buyer. When we do sell most of the time it's for pennies.

We're not getting these figures for most of the players listed.

I mean 25m for Martial is insane, we couldn't even sell him at all, we'd have to let him go for free to get rid.

 

[DOTA]

I mean 25m for Martial is insane, we couldn't even sell him at all, we'd have to let him go for free to get rid.

Maybe.

He did supposedly take a large pay cut in order to get his Sevilla loan. I guess he may have lost interest in the idea of trying to re-ignite his career (and maybe there won't be teams keen to gamble on him) after that attempt failed miserably but the fact he's previously had such an urge makes me think there's a chance.

 

[Theonas]

How much did Arsenal spend from a worse position than us last year to challenging this year? Or how much was Liverpool's spend when they were challenging? We need cohesion that can only comes from a consistent way of playing, top quality coaching and supplemented by players who fit, they don't have to be expensive.

 

[tentan]

Every season we fantasise about raising loads of money with sales and it never happens, we end up stuck with players we wanted rid of for another year or we have to loan them because we can't find a buyer. When we do sell most of the time it's for pennies.

We're not getting these figures for most of the players listed.

I mean 25m for Martial is insane, we couldn't even sell him at all, we'd have to let him go for free to get rid.

Maybe.

He did supposedly take a large pay cut in order to get his Sevilla loan. I guess he may have lost interest in the idea of trying to re-ignite his career (and maybe there won't be teams keen to gamble on him) after that attempt failed miserably but the fact he's previously had such an urge makes me think there's a chance.

Also no-one would pay 25m for Maguire.

 

[Red in STL]

Let's genuinely give this a try:

So, to actually compete for the title against City (not just fighting to stay top 4) we would need the following in my opinion:

Striker - £100m
Backup striker - £30m
Midfielder who can play #6 and is versatile - £60m
Good right winger to compete with Antony
Right back - £40m
Centre back (backup or alternate) - £40m
Goalkeeper - £50m
And possibly a backup left back -£25m

We can't just have Antony as our right wing options and play Bruno out of position there. I don't think Amad will be good enough. I think the above numbers would be roughly right.

We can offer this by selling a few players:

McTom - £20m
Martial -£15m
Maguire - £25m
Sancho -£25m
De Gea? - £25m
Amad - £20m

All in all, I think £200m of GOOD spending and we could be looking to challenge. I don't think we'd win it but we could be fighting it out until the last part of the season.

If we were to get someone like Osimhen or Kolo Muani for the striker then we might be in with a fighting chance but we would need Antony to figure out how to pass and not just do the same shot every time, Rashford would need to replicate his purple patch from this season etc.

De Gea is worth nothing, he's out of contract unless he signs a new one and that would mean he's staying, and why would you ever sell Amad, at worst he's competition for Antony unless that's Pellestri which seems unlikely, so the one to sell is Pellestri

Can't see Sancho or Martial leaving, they earn too much and they'll never get that kind of money elsewhere, DvB could leave but he's worth next to nothing given his injury, Henderson should go but he'll be hard to sell with his wages

 

[tombombadil]

2 billion pounds. Building a good team and coaching staff overnight is not cheap. Paying their salaries ain't cheap either. Bribing the FA and referees for favourable schedules and referee calls during a match also isn't cheap. VAR ain't gonna turn a blind eye for nothing.

 

[Ted Lasso]

The biggest price will be the cost of getting the Glazers out.

 

[RedRonaldo]

Buy smart and sell smart will be a good start.

 

[ManRed]

£250m + sales

OUT: Martial, Sancho, Dvb, Fred, Scott, Dalot, Maguire, De Gea, Henderson, Telles, Williams

IN: Striker, Backup ST, Backup Midfield, RB, CB, GK

 

[Yagami]

Not as much as people fear.

To compete next season, first I'll look at the players I think could start for a title challenging side:

???
AWB Varane Martinez Shaw
Casemiro ???
??? Bruno Rashford
???
​

AWB, Varane, Casemiro and Bruno are all iffy. Ideally they'd all be upgraded on but you gotta be realistic. Despite all the flaws all four have, with the right players beside them, they can be carried.

That's four positions which is doable. Really five as Maguire will leave so we'll need another CB. Arsenal only really added three first team players this year (Saliba returning from loan, Jesus and Trossard in January) to push on, and maybe could've even won it had Saliba not got injured.

All we have to do is buy smart. A press resistant central midfielder that can carry Casemiro in the possession phase like Modric did for him at Madrid and Arthur did for him when Brazil actually won something. A RW who can dribble and keep the ball under pressure to add a dimension to our attack that's lacking. A CF who can hold the ball up under pressure, bring the rest of the team into play, and can cause trouble for opposition defences as an individual on top of that. A modern goalie. And a CB who can be relied upon to cover Varane's inevitable injuries.

That modern GK and those three additions to the outfield team who are strong under pressure - which is what we're lacking the most - on top of ten Hag's coaching would be promising enough.

We won't need to spend much on a back-up CB. There are plenty of press resistant central midfielders we can get for cheap. RW is easy - Lee Kang-in for £17m. I dunno about the goalie situation. The CF position is where we may potentially have to spend big, but if we buy smart in the other positions, and sell well, it's all doable.

 

[croadyman]

£400m+

It's not just the first XI, it's the squad you need to compete with City. Liverpool had one of the best first XI's in Europe, and came behind 1 point twice, because they didn't have rotation options for the front 3.

Yeah need to improve our first XI and depth

 

[cafecillos]

 

[TheLord]

Oh, for the title. Not with Pep around, I don't think that's possible

 

[The Boy]

It's not about the amount so much as the manager, time and the ability to fix mistakes.

Pep has definitely evolved at City and they look more a machine now than they ever have done under him. EtH could theoretically do the same but he also needs time to evolve. Then there's the mistakes, City can buy a player who doesn't work out and then spend 60-70 million in the next window to fix that mistake, that's where you need the money.

Finally you need the whole club pulling in the same direction, that's what has worked at Brighton with a much lower level of funding and with unlimited funds you end up with a City, PSG shows how unlimited funds can fail because of trouble behind the scenes and everyone pulling in different directions.

City are currently in the perfect place, unlimited funds, great manager and great set up throughout the club, I don't think we've ever seen a club in this position before.

 

[tenpoless]

500 mil = title contender
750 mil = title and CL contender

 

[pocco]

I think we'd need to have an insane team to compete with Pep's City. It's not just a case of signing decent players and them being "well coached". I think I'd need to see more proof that the coaching is in a style of football that is actually effective against most teams. We were well coached under LVG but we'd have never won anything of note playing his we did. I need to see more right now to be convinced.

 

[Woziak]

On a serious note we were in a title race in January and therefore you can there is the foundation. I think we would genuinely need to add the following players to be in a title race; G Donnaruma, KMJ, Hakimi, M Veratti, M Caciedo, J Bellingham, M Kudas, V Osimhen, R Hojlund, O Dembe

Squad - GK (3) G Donnaruma, D Gea, T Heaton,
Defenders(9) - Hakimi, AWB, Dalot, R Varane, V Lindelof, L Martinez, KMJ, L Shaw, A Davies you
Midfielders(7) - Casemeiro, Caciedo, M Veratti, Eriksen, Bruno, M Kudas, J Bellingham
Attack (7) - Osimhen, R Hojlund, Rashford, Garnaucho, Antony, J Sancho, O Dembele

Of course this would never happen in a million years but that squad would compete with City, might even beat it but would cost £750m so that’s the answer anything from £500m to compete probably £750m to win or compete for CL

 

[pacifictheme]

Genuinely don't see us competing with city until pep leaves. We are nowhere near well run enough to do it.

 

[DJ_21]

How much did Arsenal spend from a worse position than us last year to challenging this year? Or how much was Liverpool's spend when they were challenging? We need cohesion that can only comes from a consistent way of playing, top quality coaching and supplemented by players who fit, they don't have to be expensive.

100% agree with you. It’s not all about spending ridiculous amounts. Obviously we need players to improve the squad and specifically a proven goalscorer to help us challenge but it also comes down to the spirit of the team and the style of play. They need to work as a team to compete.

 

[DJ_21]

500 mil = title contender
750 mil = title and CL contender

Don’t think inter have spent 750m to compete in the CL. They have 3 of our rejects Sometimes it comes down to the luck of the draw.

 

[Spark]

You can’t add 5+ first team players and expect to compete immediately. Look at City’s spending when they were first taken over - new team every year. Wasn’t until they had an established spine being topped up each season that they started truly dominating.

If you want to work out what it’ll take, you need a 5 year plan, something we have either never had post SAF or just terrible ones that failed quickly.

We obviously need strikers - plural. One world class, one back up. Then strengthen defence to lower dependence on the disgusting brothers (harsh on Lindelof, mainly Maguire) and then another world class midfielder. Realistically this is achievable over three transfer windows - if all stars align, we’ll be far more competitive for the 24/25 season, which will hopefully see us field a world class goalkeeper replacing De Gea.

Never know, ten bit might pull a rabbit out of the hat and have us challenge soon. But I think in his 3rd season we should see considerable improvement.

 

[Chicharo]

As people have already stated, it's not about the price, it's about how we actually spend the money.
I would argue that the only player whom we signed in the past couple of years and who has both mentality and quality to start on regular basis is Lisandro. Then Casemiro, and then Varane (I put them behind only because of their age, plus Varane is injury-prone).
That should be a recipe for building a winning team. After that it's ETH job to put together the puzzle

 

[TheRedDevil'sAdvocate]

Countless, and even that will probably not be enough. United are the epitome of throwing money into a bottomless pit.

There's a fundamental fault both in the manner the people who run the club evaluate players and in the way they imagine the first team moving forward. It's easy to spot it in the way Levy runs Spurs and laugh when Conte spills it out, but the same thing is happening with us (with much more money at stake).

I'll tell you this, though. Let's start with the basics before we even consider opening the war chest. When you see two buses full of experts arriving at Carrington, ready to allow ETH to focus solely on implementing his vision, then you can hope again.

 

[Amarsdd]

Spoiler

 

[Sparky Rhiwabon]

About £1bn over 3-4 years

 

[Siorac]

There's a fundamental fault both in the manner the people who run the club evaluate players and in the way they imagine the first team moving forward. It's easy to spot it in the way Levy runs Spurs and laugh when Conte spills it out, but the same thing is happening with us (with much more money at stake).

Yes indeed. And it will be demonstrated once again if we spend the entire summer chasing Harry Kane.

 

[TheGame]

I think Paul Merson in the man to ask.

Surely its Ivan Toney on the best odds?

 

[KiD MoYeS]

Probably about 115 charges.

 

[Oranges038]

Surely its Ivan Toney on the best odds?

Can't time stamp it. Starts 3.20

This is a 6-700million pounds, probably a billion pounds, 100m, half a billion, eh eh eh what would it be...8, 900 million, 700 miliion?

 

[userman]

I would say that it can be done with a net spend of £100m adressing the key areas in the starting 11.
Adressing those key areas in the starting 11 will also improve our squad-depth by making some of this seasons "starters" the backups next season, and make us better equipped to last a full season.
However, to make the most out of that £100m we need Murtough, Fletcher and ETH to cooperate closely, be smart, decisive, and with full autonomy from any owners (be it Glazers, Sir Jim, Qatar or whoever).

 

[Invictus]

United gets very little bang for its buck in the mercato and the club has a haphazard recruitment methodology — so it's exceedingly hard to come up with some sort of concrete number. In a hypothetical season where City's not at its best in the league, we could challenge with the addition of about 3 players who make a profound and instant impact (so an investment of £150, roughly speaking?) However, consistently competing for the title against them is next to impossible; a bitter pill to swallow, but it's time to face the reality of this era. They're an optimized precision machine with way too many positive factors in their favor, and you can no longer create an organic dynasty (like United's or Liverpool's of yesteryears).

• One of the absolute greatest managers of all time, who is also an expert at producing the highest levels of league performance.
• More than half-a-decade of continuity under the aforementioned manager, so his principles are fully absorbed and effortlessly implemented on the pitch.
• Support-structure that is in lockstep with him, spearheaded by familiar faces in Ferran Soriano and Txiki Begiristain.
• Top-class recruitment for the most part (with the managers vision and principles of play in mind), and signing really good, value-for-money players at just the right time: Ederson is probably the best goalkeeper in possession in football history and was signed at age 24, with Rodri little time was wasted in acquiring the present-day equivalent of Busquets or Javi Martínez, Bernardo Silva was signed at age 23 following a wonderful season with Monaco, De Bruyne was signed at age 24 after producing one of the greatest individual seasons in modern Bundesliga, Håland was signed at age 21 and has broken all sorts of records in his first season, and so on and so forth.
• By now they have peerless strength in depth, and a mentality and culture of winning (and excellence) has taken taken hold at the club — that can make all the difference when the going gets tough for rivals who lack similar composure, squad pieces and focus.
• The owner seems to want what's best for the club (particularly wrt. fulfilment of sporting objectives), has the wealth of a Top 30-ish national economy at his disposal, is more than willing to fund a ruthless rectification of mistakes (while enables them to move on from ill-suited players), seems patient and gives a wide berth to actual footballing experts (looking at you, Joel Glazer).

A club can have some of those factors in its favor, which creates a perfect storm for a while (like Liverpool (who could have won 3 league titles in another era, as they registered 97 points in 2019 and 92 points in 2022) in recent years with an elite managers in Klopp, top recruitment for a few seasons, robust mentality) and still fall off because that historically significant level cannot be maintained without comparable investment from the ownership or decision-making from the administrators — the margin for error is wafer thin. I'm afraid only Newcastle United possesses the fundamentals to go toe-to-toe with Manchester City in a “big picture” sense, and they will have to get every major decision right to reach a similar level.

 

[ericPSG]

Are we talking net spend because if we're willing to be ruthless, we can recoup a significant sum.

Out:
Martial - 25m
Sancho - 40m
Vdb - 15m
Mctom - 25m
Telles - 5m
Williams - 5m
Bailly - 8m
Maguire - 25m
Henderson - 25m
Dalot - 20m

173m

In:
Kane - 90m
Backup striker - 40m
New CM - 80m
Rabiot - Free
Backup DM - 40m
KMJ - 42m
RB - 40m
GK - 50m

382m

Net would probably sit between 190-210m

Gives us a squad roughly:

Kane/Backup
Rashford/Garnacho
Antony/Amad
Bruno/Eriksen
New CM/Rabiot/Fred
Casemiro
Shaw/Malacia
Martinez/Lindelof
KMJ/Varane
New RB/AWB
New GK/DDG

I think this team can compete, still not going to beat City unless they have an off season as the team would need to bed in. It goes without saying we will never sell this well, nor buy this many.

United will never get that much money from sales because the players are overpaid
PSG overpay even more and is forced to loan and still pay part of the salary

That’s the strength of City. They don’t overpay
20M£ a year for kdb and Haaland
Bernardo Silva, Marhez and Gundogan are under 8M£

Who would pay 25M for Martial or Maguire and then pay them 13 and 10M a year?

 

[AndySmith1990]

We've spent more than enough in the past decade to have won at least a couple titles. Liverpool managed it with less spend than us, and Arsenal have come far closer than we have. It's not as simple as coming up with a number and then throwing money at the problem as we well know

Recruitment obviously needs significant improvement
The wages we pay need reducing. It drastically impacts our ability to sell. Why is a lazy waster like Martial on over £200k? Why is a backup keeper on loan earning over £100k? Just two examples of how ridiculous we are at contract negotiation.
We need to be far more ruthless is moving players on, instead of this sentimental nonsense of "just one more season" ... Just in case they magically transform into a world class player

Get all that right and we already spend enough to challenge for titles

 

[sifi36]

Position	Starter	Back-up/Prospect	Sell/Release	Incoming Fees	Notes
GK		De Gea	Henderson	£ 15,000,000.00	DDG is antithetical to the style all top teams play. Henderson is young enough to recoup some value
RB		AWB	Dalot	£ 15,000,000.00	Sell Dalot as he's got more value, plus AWB can give us something different if against a tough opponent e.g. Leao/Vinicius, see Kyle Walker
RCB	Varane		Bailly, Jones, Tuanzebe, Mengi	£ 3,500,000.00
LCB	Martinez	Lindelof	Maguire	£ 17,500,000.00
LB	Shaw	Malacia	Telles	£ 5,000,000.00
DM	Casemiro		McTominay	£ 17,500,000.00	McTominay isn't capable of the role we need him for
8		Eriksen	Fred	£ -
10	Bruno	Sancho	Van De Beek	£ 10,000,000.00	Sancho isn't the ideal back-up and Donny may be a tough sell given his injury
RW	Antony	Amad			Not ideal, but it will wait until next Summer
CF		Martial			Won't be able to shift Martial with the wages he's on, so will have to made do with him as a back-up next season
LW	Rashford	Garnacho	Elanga	£ 17,500,000.00
			Total Receipts	£ 101,000,000.00
			Players Sold	8​
			Players Released	3​

That's what I would do with squad over the next two windows. The incoming fees are values on TransferMarkt minus 20% (the other "United tax"). This means we need a starting:

• Goalkeeper
• Right Back
• 8
• Centre -forward

And back-ups/prospects for:

• Right centre-back
• Defensive Midfield
• Striker (Martial is out of contract next Summer)

Here's my attempt at some names. "Fee Required" is TransferMarkt value plus 20% (the more well-known United tax). I've done it the cheaper/better value way and if money was no object.

Position	Role	Value	Fee Required	Cost no Object	Fee Required
Goalkeeper	Starter	Koen Casteels	£ 8,347,826.09	Diogo Costa	£ 46,956,521.74
Right Back	Starter	Vanderson	£ 18,782,608.70	Jeremie Frompong	£ 36,521,739.13
8	Starter	Enzo Le Fee	£ 15,652,173.91	Nicolo Barella	£ 73,043,478.26
Centre -forward	Starter	Jonathan David	£ 62,608,695.65	Osimhen	£ 104,347,826.09
Right centre-back	Back-up/Prospect	Jean-Clair Todibo	£ 31,304,347.83	Kim Min-Jae	£ 43,000,000.00
Defensive Midfield	Back-up/Prospect	Manuel Ugarte	£ 26,086,956.52	Manuel Ugarte	£ 26,086,956.52
Centre-Forward	Back-up/Prospect	Rasmus Hojlund	£ 36,521,739.13	Florin Balogun	£ 26,086,956.52
		Cheap Total	£ 199,304,347.83	Cost No Object Total	£ 356,043,478.26
		Less Incoming Fees	£ 101,000,000.00	Less Incoming Fees	£ 101,000,000.00
		Net Spend	£ 98,304,347.83	Net Spend	£ 255,043,478.26

That would give us:

Position	Starter	Back-up/Prospect
GK	Casteels	De Gea
RB	Vanderson	AWB
RCB	Varane	Todibo
LCB	Martinez	Lindelof
LB	Shaw	Malacia
DM	Casemiro	Ugarte
8	Le Fee	Eriksen
10	Bruno	Sancho
RW	Antony	Amad
CF	David	Hojlund, Martial
LW	Rashford	Garnacho

Or in an ideal world:

Position	Starter	Back-up/Prospect
GK	Costa	De Gea
RB	Frimpong	AWB
RCB	Varane	Min-Jae
LCB	Martinez	Lindelof
LB	Shaw	Malacia
DM	Casemiro	Ugarte
8	Barella	Eriksen
10	Bruno	Sancho
RW	Antony	Amad
CF	Osimhen	Balogun, Martial
LW	Rashford	Garnacho

Going back to the question in the OP, my answer is £200-350 million gross and £100-250 million net.

 

[UpWithRivers]

Theoretically we could do it with 0 spent. All we need is for our current players to peak or at least play somewhere near to their potential at the same time - Sancho/Amad/Antony/Garnacho and even Greenwood. Then we would rely on the likes of De Gea to pick up form, Rashford to have another blinding season and other intangible things like having low injuries. Add a couple of smart free signings - Ndika, Rabiot, Benzema for example and its not impossible we could come second with nothing spent. It probably wont be pretty play out the back pressing football but it could be done.

On the other hand we could spend a billion and be nowhere near. As we have already proved.

So in answer to the question. Who knows?

 

[Forevergiggs1]

If we had Brightons or even Leicesters scouting staff we'd need around £150m but as we don't we'd probably need around £400m hopefully offset by getting £150m by selling players like Maguire, Martial, Donnie and Sancho.

 

[el_loco_bielsa]

Because the financial dopers have completely changed the landscape, you need to spend enough to buy you two teams of 50m+ players in every position to compete with what they’ve got.

Bearing in mind you’ll have a failure rate of approx 20-50% depending on how good or bad your scouting is, you then will need to be allowing for a significant waste budget on top.

So you might get lucky and compete in a title challenge by dint of the dopers having an off-season which they do once every 3-4 years but it won’t last the season after because they’ll simply spend another cool £200m of the sheikh’s pocket money to re-establish their dominance.

 

[Lentwood]

The three non-negotiables are a high-class CM (Bellingham/De Jong?), a high-class GK (Costa?) and a high-class CF (Osimhen/Kane?).

Until we address those three areas, its impossible to win it. So thats £250m or so, I'd say.

After that, the needle shifts from "impossible" to "unlikely"....to continue to move closer to winning it then depends on continued improvement on the training pitch and adding good depth to the squad...plus some luck with injuries/form/decisions

 

[JB7]

United will never get that much money from sales because the players are overpaid
PSG overpay even more and is forced to loan and still pay part of the salary

That’s the strength of City. They don’t overpay
20M£ a year for kdb and Haaland
Bernardo Silva, Marhez and Gundogan are under 8M£

Who would pay 25M for Martial or Maguire and then pay them 13 and 10M a year?

People actually believe this shit?

 

[Adebisi's Hat]

Its difficult to put a figure on it buts its more about getting the right players in with hungry attitudes, mental toughness and ETH and the lads coaching them to improve. Going full Woody and spunking money at Neymar et al and going mad with crazy contracts to 'retain assets' just wont cut it.

Whatever we say about City they are on the verge of a treble with players like Ake and Akanji playing most of the season in defence. Thats about coaching, as those lads were good but not best in class superstars. Having players like Haaland around to score goals to cover mistakes also helps of course, which is something we missed this season.