Manchester United\u2019s difficulties on the pitch have been well documented, but a new statistical study has underlined a separate problem: a transfer strategy that has drained value at an alarming rate.<\/p>\n
The CIES Football Observatory has ranked clubs around the world by the \u201cappreciation or depreciation in value of non-academy players signed over the past five years.\u201d The method combines fees paid and received for players who have left, while current players are measured against their present market value. Only clubs with spending and income above $56 million since 2022 were included, with add-ons counted whether or not they have already been paid.<\/p>\n
On that basis, United sit as the European club to lose the most on signings over the past five years. Their total depreciation stands at $452 million, a figure surpassed only by Al Hilal (-$560 million) across the global list.<\/p>\n
Of United\u2019s overall loss, $208 million relates to players who have already left on permanent deals, including Sancho, H\u00f8jlund and Antony. A further $244.5 million has been lost on players still at the club. That total is far above any other European side.<\/p>\n
Tottenham Hotspur are the nearest continental comparison, having lost $210 million, less than half of United\u2019s figure. By contrast, local rivals Manchester City are among the biggest winners, ranking fifth with almost $500 million added in value over the same period.<\/p>\n
Eintracht Frankfurt (+$588 million), Real Madrid (+$587 million), Paris Saint-Germain (+$547 million) and Benfica (+$545 million) sit above City. Chelsea also post a positive return at $200 million, while Arsenal (+$123 million) and Liverpool (+$14.5 million) have seen their signings increase in value overall.<\/p>\n
United, however, have not dramatically altered course. Their spending has become less erratic over the last two seasons, but they still spent more than $400 million on new arrivals, and none apart from the cost-effective Senne Lammens have yet justified their price tag.<\/p>\n
Their approach of strengthening one area at a time has also hurt results and, in turn, the value of the current squad. They focused on attack with Benjamin \u0160e\u0161ko, Bryan Mbeumo and Matheus Cunha in 2025, then turned to midfield last summer with Youri Tielemans, Andrey Santos and Carlos Baleba. The defence, presumably, will be next.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A new study shows Manchester United have lost $452 million on signings over five years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22126,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[230,179],"tags":[1162,182],"class_list":["post-22127","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-analytics-stats","category-manchester-united","tag-analytics","tag-transfers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22127"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22127\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}