Ahen the transfer market closes on Thursday, the twenty Premier League clubs have already spent 1.8 billion euros this summer. The 2017 record (1.7 billion euros) has already been beaten, and the last days of the transfer window still promise many upheavals. The symbolic bar of two billion euros could thus be crossed, proof that England and its football are not experiencing the crisis. Gradually, this championship is transformed into Super League as the gap is widening on the means and the competitiveness with the rest of Europe.
Nottingham Forest: the promoted without limits
If we knew that the big clubs are attractive with unlimited funds, even the second knives now are able to take out the checkbook for sums that make you dizzy. OL star Lucas Paqueta will sign for West Ham for 60 million euros. Difficult to understand this choice for a thrilling player from the L1, who will find himself in a team not necessarily compatible with his style of play… Regardless of the contexts, the projects and the affinities with the coaches: all roads lead across the Channel .
If West Ham is one example among many others, the most glaring remains Nottingham Forest. A historic club in English football, notably with its two victories in the Champions League at the end of the 1970s, it has returned to the elite after more than two decades of absence. Its owner wanted to mark the occasion with a fiery transfer window: 16 recruits for a totally crazy total amount of 152 million euros. And Forest still intends to strengthen by Thursday. By way of comparison, AJ Auxerre, with its 3.75 million euros spent this summer for its recovery in Ligue 1, pales in comparison…
“I have never seen a bag of tickets score”
Should we then establish a financial policeman to limit these crazy expenses and not widen the gap between the perfidious Albion and its competitors? Unrestrictive in recent years, financial fair play still exists and on its latest report, only Arsenal have received a slight warning. It is therefore difficult to imagine this championship slowing down and becoming wiser. With increasingly substantial income from TV rights and an attractiveness where even PSG, Barça and Real sometimes lack arguments, the Premier League is stronger than ever.
With such means, the English clubs therefore do not fear much. Even Brexit, which posed an administrative threat to bringing in players, had no impact. Even if Johan Cruyff, who said “I have never seen a bag of tickets score”, believed that money did not necessarily bring happiness in the round ball, we cannot close our eyes to it. Many clubs, especially in France, would like to have the same strike force. But that doesn’t prevent you from being smart and surrounding yourself well to be competitive on your scale, as RC Lens shows us.
