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4 months ago
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The 2024 January transfer window is now officially closed for Premier League clubs, when it comes to bringing in reinforcements for the second half of this 2023/24 season.
It has been absolutely remarkable.
This January transfer window proving yet again, that in modern day football, nothing should surprise you.
However, this is surprising in a very different way, on this occasion.
In the 2023 January transfer window, Chelsea spent more money on one player (£107m on Enzo Fernandez), than has been spent in the entire 2024 January transfer window!
That’s right, only £100m spent on transfer fees in the window just closed.
The biggest permanent deal n deadline day was Crystal Palace signing Blackburn midfielder Adam Wharton for an initial £18m, which could potentially rising to £22m.
Whilst the biggest deal of all in this 2024 January transfer window, has been Tottenham spending £26.7m on Genoa centre-back Radu Dragusin.
The biggest spending Premier League club this time is Crystal Palace with £30.5m, Blackburn midfielder Adam Wharton (£22m) and Genk right-back Daniel Munoz (£8.5m).
Anybody who was trying to make out that Newcastle United were some kind of stand out this 2024 January transfer window, when it came to not spending major money, are now looking a little foolish.
With clearly a massive shift all around the Premier League in this particular window.
Even Chelsea reining it in!
A year ago, Chelsea alone spent around £300m in the 2023 January transfer window, with the arrivals including Enzo Fernandez (£107m), Mykhaylo Mudryk (£62m), Benoit Badiashile (£35m), Noni Madueke (£29m), Malo Gusto (£26.3m), Andrey Santos (£18m), David Dietro Fofana (£10.6m) and Joao Felix (Loan).
This BBC Sport table of spending by Premier League clubs in the various January windows shows what a surprise this latest one is.
A £715m drop from the 2023 January transfer window, whilst only the 2021 January window (during Covid and no crowds) of £70m saw less spent than this year, over the course of the last decade.
BBC Sport report on 2024 January transfer window – 2 February 2024:
Spending by Premier League clubs in January dipped significantly after three successive record-breaking windows – with teams splashing out £715m less than in the 2023 winter window.
The combined outlay of the 20 top-flight clubs was £100m – the lowest January spend in a non-Covid season since £60m in 2011-12 – and vastly lower than last year’s spend of £815m, according to financial services firm Deloitte.
Just £30m in disclosed fees was spent on deadline day, another considerable drop on the £275m spent on the same day 12 months ago.
There were only 17 permanent transfers made by Premier League clubs during the window, with a further 13 loan deals – including seven permanent and six loan deals on deadline day.
Ligue 1 clubs had the highest gross transfer spend among Europe’s ‘big five’ with expenditure of £162m, followed by the Premier League (£100m), Serie A (£85m), Bundesliga (£70m) and La Liga (£70m)
It is the first January window since 2019 that the Premier League was not the biggest spending league globally – and first window since summer 2011 that it was not Europe’s biggest spending league
Spending by Saudi Pro League clubs was significantly lower in this January transfer window (£21.3m) compared to the £853m spent in the summer 2023 window.
Tim Bridge, lead partner in Deloitte’s Sports Business Group, said: “After record-breaking spending in the last three transfer windows, Premier League clubs’ spending this January has been subdued.
“The more prudent approach is likely driven by the high level of spend invested during the summer window but may also have been influenced by a heightened awareness of the Premier League’s financial regulations and the potential repercussions of non-compliance.
“Securing the highest quality player talent remains pivotal for Premier League clubs, but we’ve seen in this window that retention has been of higher priority than attraction.”

 
