Hammers balance the books

This summers transfer dealings have been made all the more incredible in the way David Sullivan has managed to balance the financial books in the wake of a crazy inflated transfer market.

Yesterday’s transfer of Javier Hernandez for £16m has bought the summer spending to £45m or closer to £50m when you factor in signing-on bonuses and agent fees.

However, the sale of  Havard Nordveit for a reported £8m, Enner Valencia for £7m and Darren Randolph for £5m brings back £20m the other way meaning the actual net spend is around £30m so far.

The wages tell a similar tell, the sale, end of loan or release of Darren Randolph, Alvaro Arbeloa, Jonathan Calleri, Havard Nordtveit, Enner Valencia, Gokhan Tore, Sam Howes, Sam Ford, Kyle Knoyle, Sam Westley, Stephen Hendrie and Raphael Spiegel save combined weekly wages of around £335,00o per week or around £17.5m per year.

The combined weekly wages Joe Hart, Marko Arnautović, Pablo Zabaleta and Javier Hernandez will cost the Hammers around £415,000 per week or £21.5m per year meaning the net wage increase is just £80,000 per week or £4m per year on the annual wage budget.