Net Spend

[Donki]

Yeah Levy grew the new training ground with magic beans he bought at Hackney market and the new stadium he wished by the power of a magical genie! How grown men can be so blinded by bullshit is unreal.

 

[The General]

What was Chelsea's net spend last summer? They bought Costa and Fabregas but sold Ruiz, De Bruyn etc. I think they may even have made a small profit. And yet they led the league from start to finish. Compare their spending to Man C, Man U and Arsenal last summer and you'll realise your 'fact' is in fact not a fact.

Disclaimer - Yes I know Chelsea had a decade of buying titles preceding Mourinho's latest stint in charge.

What a dreadful counter argument. Chelsea have a huge positive net spend over the last 10 years! Moreover I think you're forgetting a few players they bought last year, ie Felipe, Remy, etc. However I didn't say the team that spends the most wins the title the next season. I said there is a clear correlation between positive net spend and success. This is an indisputable fact.

 

[The General]

Yeah, this bit isn't true either.

There is a far stronger correlation between wages and league performance than there is with transfer expenditure. I'm going to cite Why England Lose by Kuper and Szymanski as my primary evidence for this view.

At April 2015 the wages table showed United, City and Chelsea with similar wage bills, followed by the goons, followed by Liverpool, then us, (we're some way behind Liverpool). After that there's a raft of clubs with very similar levels of spending on wages. You have a few outliers, (QPR, southamptioon), but largely wages and league performance correlate.

Do you have anything to back your claim that net transfer expenditure has a stronger link to league performance than this? I'd be keen to see it if you have. I'm kind of talking about numbers and things here.

I don't remember saying net spend had a stronger link. You've misquoted me sir. I said it was a fact that net spend was correlated to success. The three clubs with the largest net spend over the last 5 years are Man City, Chelsea, Man United. With Arsenal and Liverpool next. Are these not the most successful clubs in the premier league? We are actually an outlier over the last 5 years and for that Levy and the coaches should be applauded. I wholeheartedly agree wages and success are also correlated. However I think it almost impossible to prove which is more important because the clubs with the highest wages also have the highest net spend.

 

[SteveH]

Yeah Levy grew the new training ground with magic beans he bought at Hackney market and the new stadium he wished by the power of a magical genie! How grown men can be so blinded by bullshit is unreal.

"grown men" yeah right

 

[quackers]

What a dreadful counter argument. Chelsea have a huge positive net spend over the last 10 years! Moreover I think you're forgetting a few players they bought last year, ie Felipe, Remy, etc. However I didn't say the team that spends the most wins the title the next season. I said there is a clear correlation between positive net spend and success. This is an indisputable fact.

Think Chavs currently "owe" Roman just shy of £1bn. I'm pretty sure he tops them up every year too so that number just grows.

 

[SNAFU_Clarke]

Yeah, you're wrong.

Edit: Not you Quackers. You might well be right.

 

[Rout-Ledge]

Why do people talk about net spend only in terms of headline transfer fees? It's easy but it's wrong. There are many other sources of incoming and outgoing £££.

 

[SNAFU_Clarke]

Why do people talk about net spend only in terms of headline transfer fees?

Christ knows.

 

[beats1]

you're saying in the space of a season our wages went up £24m? I'd be very surprised by that? Over a few years, yeah, I could understand.

But again you're falling into the trap of talking about a single aspect. Every time someone mentions wages someone else could mention tv money inflation, commercial revenue etc.. I'm not overlooking any aspects.

I feel our heroes left prematurely because they didn't see any other world class talent coming in alongside them, and didn't think they could win stuff as a result.

You said there wasn't any more investment the season our revenue shot up from the CL and actually Wages went up by £24m in one season

Our wage vs turnover before and during the CL season

 

[dontcallme]

West Ham are 6th in net spend over the 5 years with Sunderland in 8th. We're currently bottom if this table is to be believed:

http://www.transferleague.co.uk/pre...tables/premier-league-table-last-five-seasons

The correlation between wage bill and success does seem to be much stronger than net spend.

But probably what has a bigger truth to our situation is over the last 5 years we've finished above Liverpool 4 times. Them trying to spend their way to being better simply isn't working.

 

[Bus-Conductor]

@The General & @SNAFU_Clarke

The correlation between net spend and success is only vaguely relevant for the top four teams really, and even in their mini league the net spend really has no direct correlation. Looking at the last 5 years averages, there are so many wild disparities between net spend and league position you cannot draw any meaningful true correlation. Liverpool have averaged a higher net spend than Arsenal. West Ham have only net spent 9m less than Arsenal. Just about every team in the EPL had a higher net spend than us, and the vast anomalies continue. Below the top 4 there is virtually no correlation between net spend and league place.

(at this point I probably owe @Trix an apology, as this is perhaps what he was getting at).

On the other hand, the correlation between wage spend and league position is far closer and more ordered with the anomalies often being measured in smaller increments.

http://www.transferleague.co.uk/pre...tables/premier-league-table-last-five-seasons

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/fo...y-with-Premier-Leagues-highest-wage-bill.html

 

[Bus-Conductor]

When responding to @Trix I thought he was meaning "what has net spend got to do with our own transfer dealings". What he was probably meaning was in the grand scheme of things outside a couple of teams, net spend ratios are pretty meaningless.

 

[Mullers]

Your argument seems to be with Frank Gibbs, everyone else looks to be on your side.

 

[beats1]

West Ham are 6th in net spend over the 5 years with Sunderland in 8th. We're currently bottom if this table is to be believed:

http://www.transferleague.co.uk/pre...tables/premier-league-table-last-five-seasons

The correlation between wage bill and success does seem to be much stronger than net spend.

But probably what has a bigger truth to our situation is over the last 5 years we've finished above Liverpool 4 times. Them trying to spend their way to being better simply isn't working.

I don't doubt that the correlation with net spend is greater in relation to the overall team standings

However teams who do have a high net spend are more likely to improve on the back of last season, the reason why net spend doesn't do a great as a job of showing progress is because it doesn't take in to account free transfers and release clauses, these players go below their market value. So a club like sunderland whilst spending a lot has lost players for free like:
Gardner
N'Diaye
Colback
Bardsley
Cuellar
Zenden
Bramble
McFadden
Saha

Whilst changing manager every season at least once. So it would be a fair assumption spending money will result in improvement but that would require stability, not losing players on the cheap and minimising waste.

I think a lot of clubs including us at the moment are carrying a lot of waste and since the tv deal there has been a lot more waste by clubs which has made the net spend more pointless are players are being brought for a future investment or just for the sake of buying to complete a 25 man squad that manager feels he needs but doesn't end up using.

Interesting Man Utd are top because a year and a half ago they wouldn't have been and since then they have spent

Mata - £37.1m
Herrera - £34m
Shaw - £27m
Rojo - £16m
Di Maria - £60m
Blind - £14m
Falcao - £0m but at the same time a lot
Depay - £24m
Schneiderlin - £24m
Schweinsteiger - £10.6m-£14.4m
Darmian - £12.7m

They have spent around £260m to get from 7th to 4th whilst not selling any big players bar welbeck. I think to improve a team and to get a better calibre of player you spend more money in terms of transfer fees(which will result in a higher net spend unless you're carry a lot of waste) and wages. You can spend more money on wages but ultimately the best players to move you up a level will tend to cost a lot of money.

 

[SpursManChris]

Lets not drift this off topic in here, if you want quote me and take it elsewhere fine, but the bottom line for any company is not it's gross revenue or it's gross expenditure (of course they matter but only in as much as they decide the net) it's the net of those two things, it's profit or loss.

You think you can draw parallels between the non-football business world and the football business world? Really? The football commodity being human beings is obviously different to the commodity being oil. Oil doesn't have a say in where is goes, it goes to wherever its owner sends it. If big name players do not want to play for us, then how is that Levy's fault?

 

[Bus-Conductor]

You think you can draw parallels between the non-football business world and the football business world? Really? The football commodity being human beings is obviously different to the commodity being oil. Oil doesn't have a say in where is goes, it goes to wherever its owner sends it. If big name players do not want to play for us, then how is that Levy's fault?

No, the commodity is football, the game. Even in the oil industry, it's employees and specialists can choose where they work. Oil doesn't move from the ground until humans are involved, the same way football doesn't get played until humans are involved.

 

[SpursManChris]

No, the commodity is football, the game. Even in the oil industry, it's employees and specialists can choose where they work. Oil doesn't move from the ground until humans are involved, the same way football doesn't get played until humans are involved.

Exactly, so what can Levy do in order to satisfy people like yourself who want in excess of 80 million spent just to say that we have net spend?

 

[chinaman]

I would really welcome "0 Net Spend" if we had picked up suitable and capable replacements for Berba, Modric and Bale like we picked up Nabil.

Oh, correction: I'd even welcome "Negative Net Spend" in that manner.

 

[SNAFU_Clarke]

@The General & @SNAFU_Clarke

The correlation between net spend and success is only vaguely relevant for the top four teams really, and even in their mini league the net spend really has no direct correlation. Looking at the last 5 years averages, there are so many wild disparities between net spend and league position you cannot draw any meaningful true correlation. Liverpool have averaged a higher net spend than Arsenal. West Ham have only net spent 9m less than Arsenal. Just about every team in the EPL had a higher net spend than us, and the vast anomalies continue. Below the top 4 there is virtually no correlation between net spend and league place.

(at this point I probably owe @Trix an apology, as this is perhaps what he was getting at).

On the other hand, the correlation between wage spend and league position is far closer and more ordered with the anomalies often being measured in smaller increments.

http://www.transferleague.co.uk/pre...tables/premier-league-table-last-five-seasons

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/fo...y-with-Premier-Leagues-highest-wage-bill.html

Why have you replied to me?

 

[Bus-Conductor]

Exactly, so what can Levy do in order to satisfy people like yourself who want in excess of 80 million spent just to say that we have net spend?

What do you mean exactly ? It contradicted your post completely ?

As does your assessment of my my stance re our net spend. You couldn't be more more wrong if you were wearing three button flares that are too short, with socks, sandals and a Hawaiian motif tank top.

The last thing I think we should be doing is getting into an arms race we can't win and will only bankrupt us for decades to come.