7 Comments

The ‘net spend’ season dawns :-)

It won’t be long – if we haven’t heard them already – before those wonderful old words “net spend” come into regular usage.

There is of course no question that we need reinforcements – definitely up front and in midfield – but how much we need to spend is another question altogether.

In previous years – under such managers as Slaven and David Moyes – the summer spending discussion has been worth listening to notably with the likes of Jordan Hugill arriving at the club.

The current state of play is that £30 million will be committed plus all the monies raised in transfer fees – a situation I have absolutely no doubt was discussed with the manager when he arrived at West Ham despite the reservations already being heard among the fans.

This man is no fool and knows exactly what he needs this summer having already produced a squad which towards the end of the season was showing every sign of becoming a very good outfit indeed.

Had he not been given and accepted the long term financial l plan from the club he wouldn’t have been here at all.

There will be much raise about the Sky money but it#s important to remember that doesn’t get used for player purchases but for wages, national insurance and the like.

I have written before that our four best players of the season – Rice, Diop, Balbuena and Fabianski – cost us no more than £33 million.

And whilst we need a striker or two plus maybe a midfielder and defender these are probably not going to cost us the hundreds of millions that some may believe.

Given Pellegrini and Mario Husillos’ ability to pick up top players unbeknown to other clubs and decent prices I think the ‘net spend’ expression can take a back seat for now while we wait and see.

 

About Hugh5outhon1895

Hugh Southon is a lifelong Iron and the founding editor of ClaretandHugh. He is a national newspaper journalist of many years experience and was Bobby Moore's 'ghost' writer during the great man's lifetime. He describes ClaretandHugh as "the Hammers daily newspaper!" Follow on Twitter @hughsouthon

7 comments on “The ‘net spend’ season dawns :-)

  1. well said hugh and very true but most of our fans will not agree

  2. Given that Carroll and Chico were on big money, we will save that and put the cash into our transfer kitty.

  3. I think most are accepting that money doesn’t necessarily breed success, but we are assuming we’ll be able to dig out more Balbuena’s every season which isn’t realistic. It would be fantastic if we could buy 5 amazing players every season for 30m but unlikely, while there is value out there, every team in the Premier League are after them.

    There appears to be a feeling that those who believe we need to spend more than 30m must think we should be spending hundreds of millions. Not the case. I think we need 60m plus player sales to compete for the best players possible at our level. I don’t think that’s obscene given the amounts I expect Leicester, Everton and Wolves to spend.

    • You may be wrong. WE are after Rondon for example who is on a free. The general view that we must spend milions upon millions in tying to maintain our position and move up three or four places may also be wrong.

      • Hugh, Rondon had a option for an extra year on his contract that WBA activated in August last year meaning he is contracted till 2020… His only exit will be via his release clause. Not quite the bargain you’re suggesting…

  4. The wage bill is a more accurate representation of where we are in the pecking order and the quality of player we have.

    As stated Rondon on a “Free” has no headline figure, but not insignificant wages attached, so reviewing the wage bill is considerably more relevant.

Comments are closed.