Two trophies in 10 years - How Man Utd blew £1.2 billion on awful transfers
FT Desk
- 15 Mar 2022 23:20 GMT
- 4 min read
Manchester United were once again embarrassed in the Champions League on Tuesday night when a misfiring Atletico Madrid picked up a rather comfortable 1-0 win at Old Trafford.
Not only does the result now mean that Ralf Rangick’s side are no longer in the running for silverware this season, but it also means that the club will go five years without winning a single trophy for the first time since 1974.
Indeed, the Red Devils are in a frightful state of decay, made all the more apparent by the sheer amount of money that has been wasted by the Premier League giants over the course of the last 10 years.
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How Man Utd blew more than a £1 billion
Ten years ago Man Utd had a relatively sensible summer transfer window, when they signed Robin Van Persie, Shinji Kagawa and Wilfried Zaha for around £40m. But after that things began to get a little silly.
In the following season, Man Utd brought in Marouane Fellaini and Juan Mata for a combined £70m as David Moyes took over at the club, which ended up heralding in the current decade of turmoil that the club still finds itself in.
The 2014/15 transfer window was a particularly expensive one for the club, as they spent no less than £175m on Angel Di Maria, Luke Shaw, Ander Herrera, Marcos Rojo and Daley Blind, not to mention the best part of £7m just to loan Radamel Falcao. All but one of those players has since left the club in shame, while Shaw remains in contention for a similar fate.
The club then spent another £140m 12 months later to try and make up for the last pile of cash they burned through in the transfer window, but instead bought further duds in Anthony Martial, Morgan Schneiderlin, Memphis Depay, Matteo Darmian and a notably injured Bastian Schweinsteiger from Bayern Munich.
Most clubs would have perhaps learned their lesson at this point, but Man Utd then jumped straight back into the transfer window in 2016/17 and once again made it clear that they meant business by blowing £167m on Paul Pogba, Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Eric Bailly, then a further £179m the following season on Romelu Lukaku, Nemanja Matic, Victor Lindelof and Alexis Sanchez.
You would struggle to find a single player among that long list of names that proved to be worth even half what Man Utd paid for them, but instead of shifting towards a more careful approach in the market, the Old Trafford side have still thrown caution to wind and spent widely on unproven players in recent seasons.
In 2018/19, Fred and Diogo Dalot arrived for a combined £74m, then in 2019/20 the club spent their largest sum in a single season when Harry Maguire, Bruno Fernandes, Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Daniel James all made the move to Old Trafford for a cost of £211m. Then, last season, Donny van de Beek, Amad Diallo and Alex Telles cost a further £75m.
And, as if Man Utd fans need reminded, the club blew through £126m to sign Raphael Varane, Jadon Sancho and Cristiano Ronaldo for little more than failure in the Champions League and FA Cup, as well as serious struggle to even finish in the top four.
All in all, Man Utd have spent around £1.3 billion on buying players over the past 10 years and all they have to show for it is one Premier League title and a single FA Cup, which was won in 2016.
