We have made a lot of mistakes in the transfer market in since Fergie left.
Most expensive signings since 2013:
2013 - Mata and Fellaini for 77 million pounds. Neither signing will have a big place in United history.
2014 - Di Maria, Shaw, Herrera,Rojo,Blind,Falcao for around 190 million pounds plus Falcao loan fee. Hardly a success story there either.
2015 - Martial,Schneiderlin,Depay,Darmian,Schweinsteiger,Romero for around 160 million pounds. Martial has a lot of talent and hopefully will show that this season but others were a flop except Romero.
2016 - Mkhitaryan,Pogba,Bailly,Ibrahimovic for around 190 million pounds. Ibra a hit for his limited time and Pogba has all the talent in the world but has far more to offer I feel.
2017 - Lukaku,Matic,Lindelof,Sanchez for around 200 million pounds. A lot of flops there an no bigger in United history than Sanchez. Lindelof is ok but also needs to improve.
2018 - Fred and Dalot for around 80 million pounds. Neither worth the money in my estimate.
So that is close to 900 million pounds made available to managers to sign players for 6 seasons. Do you guys think there is another top club in Europe that has made as many errors in the transfer market as us during that period? I would go as far to claim that Van Persie is the last signing we made that can be described as a huge hit. Then if I´m not mistaken those players were signed to the request of every United manager at the time. Woodward does not tell Van Gaal or Mourinho I´m going to sign this player and you will play him. That´s not how things work at United.
Over the last seasons the following clubs have made these signings that can be defined as succesful signings in my estimate:
Liverpool: Alisson,Van Dijk,Salah,Robertson,Mane,Wijnaldum,Firmino
Man City: Mahrez,Laporte,Walker,B.Silva,Stones,Sane,Jesus,De Bruyne,Sterling,Fernandinho
Spurs:Moura,Son,Alderweireld,Davies,Alli,Dier,Eriksen
Chelsea:Rudiger,Kante,Willian
Arsenal: Leno,Aubameyang,Lacazette,
B.Dortmund: Witsel,Hakimi,Diallo,Delaney,Sancho,Dembele,Weigl,Aubameyang
Bayern: Goretzka,Coman,Sule,Gnabry,Hummels,Vidal,Kimmich,Alonso,Lewandowski,Thiago
Juventus: Ronaldo,Bonucci,Matuidi,Bentancur,Pjanic,Dybala,Sandro,Mandzukic
Imagine if we had signed Van Dijk,Sane,Son,Aubameyang and Kante out of that group rather than the dross we signed? But that´s in the past and now we must look forward. Woodward must carry his part of the blame for this transfer fiasco and to me it seems OGS and Woodward are cleaning house and I can see a clear pattern of how Ole wants us to play. Maguire,Bissaka and James are good signings in my estimate even though it´s still early day´s good signings and now we must bring Gomes,Garner,Greenwood and co into the fold. On top of that we need a DOF in order for us to develop and I think we are heading for that.