Top 6 transfer (net) spend 2017-18 (covering the summer and January windows)
@ManCity: £191.7m
@ManUtd: £127m
@LFC: £10m
@ChelseaFC: £68.1m
@SpursOfficial: £14.8m
@Arsenal: (–)£7.6m
I think the club's argument is they are making the squad leaner but upgrading and improving its quality.
Mikhi > Theo
Auba <> Sanchez
The silly one was selling Giroud. I still don't get it. I guess they're looking at it and thinking Giroud is 31 and only gonna go downhill, we've upgraded Walcott and replaced Sanchez. So they think quality has increased and all by spending nothing as we're in a surplus over the last 2 windows. So all about quality and not about quantity.
Also anyone that says project youth was nothing but a disaster is wrong. It still affects us to this day. Look how long it took to shift Ox and Theo, the latter on silly wages.
I get the argument that we need to make the squad leaner and more efficient and improve its quality but imo we've made it too lean. We have a small squad now and for a team that has injuries regularly it doesn't bode well.
We also don't have a plan B now.
Giroud was never going to play and it's tough to expect someone who's scored over 100 goals for the club to sit on the bench just in case he's needed, he's spent the last 18 months phased out of the team. Can understand why we let him go, just wished we were a little bit more ruthless and flogged him on our terms in the summer.
Sanllehi starts today.
SAS