January transfer spending down £410m due to Covid-19, FIFA report reveals

Paul Macdonald

• Updated: 23 May 2023 08:44 CDT
• 1 min read

Transfer spending in the January window was down over $570m (£410m) year-on-year as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, an official FIFA report has found.

Clubs spent a whopping $1.16bn (£836m) during the mid-season window in 2020, but that figure dropped to $590m (£425m) this year as a result of plummeting revenues relating to the continued absence of supporters.

In fact, that represents the lowest spend in a January window since 2014, and way below the $1.34bn (£966m) record set in 2018.

That is no doubt partly down to the fact that just 2,690 professional transfers were registered in January 2021, a decline of 36.2% on the year before.

The number of transfers involving fees also fell 30.5% versus the transfer period 12 months earlier.

There were still some fairly sizeable transfer dealings across Europe in particular, with Manchester United’s £37m swoop for Atalanta winger Amad Diallo among them.

That deal meant that England was the biggest-spending member association, having forked out a total of $130.5million (£94m).

In terms of the number of deals, Spain saw the most action, with 145 incoming transfers – two more than their Iberian neighbours, Portugal.

In terms of outgoing transfers, England was again the busiest with 178 deals completed.