Spending.....

Not really. Going back that far we have to include garbage like Babb, Diouf, Diao.
The only reason net spend ever gets mentioned by us is in response to the Benitez era, when he wasn't allowed the free reign previously given before H&G arrived.

we're number 1 in the net spend league

well utd got 80m for ronaldo and didnt spend it, liverpool got 50 for torres n spent it.

what must also count is man utd havent had to replace as many people as liverpool because they were more of a success

but they still seemed to spend as much despite being in debt but then again success brings a lot of money and it just plausable i guess.

liverpool were buying to replace 5-6 people each season, utd were spending 30 mill here 30 mill there on one player. rio rooney berbatov veron and then 20 mill on youth replacements nani anderson etc.

up untill torres our record was 14 mill lol.

Not sure why net spend is ever really highlighted.

What does it show - manager spent £20M but bought a misfit and sold him to another mug for £10M. He still spent the £20M on a flop but because he got £10M back it is not so bad? What about the millions on wages wasted?

Looking at some of those spends Blackburns title winning team cost buttons!

http://www.transferleague.co.uk/

Arsenal are -£ meaning they have sold players for more than they bought.

Net transfer fee tables are very misleading when it comes to what teams spend on players...true, it reflects the actual transfer fee, but it does not take into account wages or signing-on fees!

United fans seem to think that being 6th in this table shows how shrewd/clever Fergie is in the transfer market...what it doesn't show however is that United were paying the highest wages in England since the 80's up to the arrival of Abrahmovic at Chelsea...

A quick look at the wage bills from 2005-2009 shows United spending £80M+ more than Liverpool and at least £215M+ more than City in just four years!

These figures wipe out the differences between these clubs spent on fees alone and only take into account 4 years of United's financial dominance...I am sure that if the wage bill figures were available from 1992 then this would show United spending by far the biggest amount of money on wages and fees!!

So, United fans can applaud Fergie for his transfer fee 'shrewdness', but this is a completely false picture of what clubs actually spend on players, the real picture shows United spending much more than everybody else, and that is a fact!

Three cheers for Fergie and his ability to be successful whilst spending much much much more money, I don't know how he does it <cough>!

That's a fair point Billybob

http://www.sportingintelligence.com/2011/03/20/the-1-4bn-match-why-soccernomics-says-that-chelsea-and-manchester-city-should-be-in-a-two-horse-race-for-the-title-200301/

OK Billy, if you want to look at it like that, then why not look at the spend per trophy?

If you want to be the best team then you need to attract the best players and wages are a big part of that. I would also point out that it's ok to spend money as long as you can generate the funds with which to do so. Too many clubs don't and I include both Barca & Real in that. You can argue about the debts built up at united, but not one single penny was through bad form or a bad buy.

So paint it up anyway you like, for the size of your club and what you have achieved during this period, you ahve spent way too much money. The debts you had (have) have been generated by different managers spending wildly on over rated over price players, SAF has bought the odd lemon, but on the whole the vats majority of his buys have proved excellent value, cn you say the same for your club?