Mercato: why English clubs are strangely calm

815 million pounds sterling, or more than 950 million euros. Here is the amount spent by the Premier League during the last winter transfer window (2022/2023). Renowned for igniting the various windows reserved for transfers, the English championship – with colossal domestic TV rights – was logically expected to turn the corner at the start of 2024. In the wake of Todd Boehly’s Chelsea and its billion euros spent on Over the last 18 months or even Nottingham Forest, recently in the spotlight after recruiting more than twenty players during the same transfer window, English teams are multiplying, with a disconcerting frenzy, transactions. However, as we write these lines and one week before the winter market closes, the contrast is striking. Far from this observed madness of grandeur – where we never know where greatness ends and madness begins – the Premier League today demonstrates a strange passivity. Enough to question this immobility.

General expenses of less than 50 million euros!

Expected to be a central player in the market, the English championship has, in fact, so far paid out a little more than 43 million euros. A paltry amount compared to the track record displayed by clubs across the Channel in this sector. Thus, if Manchester City has just formalized the arrival of the young Argentine nugget, Claudio Echeverri (€14.5M), Brighton has strengthened its defense with the promising Valentín Barco (€9.15M) and Aston Villa has did the same by betting on the young Serbian, Kosta Nedeljkovic (€7.5M), the results remain quite meager. So yes, the winter transfer window is still far from over – Kalvin Phillips is, as such, about to join West Ham – and many twists and turns could occur in the days to come. However, today it seems difficult to imagine a scenario similar to that observed last season. A flat calm which does not fail to question many observers. In this perspective, the Daily Mail puts forward a main cause for this strange passivity of English clubs: the rules of financial fair play in England.

While Manchester City has so far managed to slip through the cracks despite new serious accusations brought by the Premier League, Everton, for their part, has been caught by the patrol. Penalized by 10 points in the championship, the Toffees are also exposed to a new sanction since they were recently accused of having spent too much during the period from 2019 to 2023. An anxiety shared by Nottingham Forest, also targeted by the Premier League press release. “In accordance with Premier League rules, both cases have been referred to the Chairman of the Judicial Panel, who will appoint separate committees to determine the appropriate sanction. The committees are independent of the Premier League and member clubs. The debates take place behind closed doors and the final decisions of the committees are made public on the Premier League website. The League will not make any further comments until then.. Most certainly cooled by this official release, the majority of English clubs are then much more reasonable.

The FPF is making Premier League clubs tremble!

Therefore, and remembering that no Premier League team has the right to exceed losses beyond 105 million pounds sterling (or approximately €123 million) over a period of three years, caution is required. Latest example? Newcastle. Although controlled by the PIF, the Saudi public investment fund, the Magpies recently announced that they had suffered a loss of £150 million, or €175 million. Worrying amounts then pushing the Toons to open the door to a few departures. “It is difficult to comment specifically on certain players, but I can say that if we want to get to where we want to get, sometimes it is necessary to transfer some of your players. All decisions we make will always be in the medium and long term interest of the club. Whether it is because of the length of the player’s contract, if the offer is too good to refuse, the squad must be renewed in certain areas. It might make sense to part ways with a player. This is part of the system inherent to the PSR (the financial fair play of the PL). There is an incentive to transfer players if you want to reinvest”declared, in this sense, Darren Eales, the general manager, of the current 10th in PL.

Anguished by possible reprisals, English clubs therefore seem to be using this winter window to adjust the accounts, or rather not to deteriorate them. “One bad window can impact three years of freedom”entrusted a Premier League general manager to the Mail Sports before focusing on the situation of the Red Devils. “Clubs want to be better managed, but clubs also need to be better managed. When Omar Berrada (recently transferred from Manchester City, editor’s note) arrives at Manchester United, he won’t need to be an expert to understand that the team’s transfer strategy has been questionable. Why let David de Gea go when he has taken a pay cut and replace him with a goalkeeper who is arguably not as good for £43.7m plus wages? Raised on the low activity of the Premier League during the month of January, a sports director of the first division also emphasized this fear of the FPF.

“Financial fair play, or fitness for purpose as we like to call it, is certainly a factor to consider. If we look at previous windows, we see that there have been a lot of mediocre players who have been transferred. Today, demand has been dampened by financial controls. Now more and more clubs are trying to move away from ad hoc transfers and adopt a strategy”. A general distrust which could, despite everything, diminish in the last line of this winter transfer window. Clinging to its historical habits, the Premier League is, in fact, still far from having said its last word. In recent hours, (The Sun)(Kyle Walker) claimed, for example, that Reece James – linked to Chelsea until June 2028 – was in the sights of Manchester City, determined to find a successor to Kyle Walker. Considering the contractual situation of the Blues right-back, there is no doubt that the operation would quickly relaunch the Premier League towards the top of the ranking of the most spending championships…