We know we can't compete with PSG and City budget-wise, but we should be going all out for top class players on a free, like Ozil and Goretzka. That way we can still do 2 or 3 every summer alongside any free players we get. In addition to this, promote 1 or 2 Reserves.
We have to be realistic and admit we still don't have top class 1st team whereas teams like City, PSG, Barca and Madrid can make another 11 with players not in their 1st team.
I really hope Mourinho takes this route. As players of Ozil and Goretzka would normally cost over 40m at least each.
As at the moment we are plugging leaks with 1st team replacements (getting rid of the deadwood slowly) .
I don't buy into this idea that you can't compete with City budgetwise. That's even more true with wages than transfer fees. We have simply spent the money better in the last few years (having spent it pretty poorly by & large in the preceeding years), with more structure and of course, getting the players to play at their best
Those who are playing regularly right now and who contribute the most are Ederson, Walker, Delph, Otamendi, Fernandinho, KDB, Silva, Aguero, Sterling & Sane. None of those players were cheap, but they mostly cost between 35 & 50M, very few other than perhaps Aguero and arguably KDB were considered truly top level marquee signings at the time we bought them. Stones & Mendy at a pinch, but I don't mention them in my list as they've been injured for a while and even then, not sure they are true marquee signings. Most have been bought over a period of three years, some longer ago. Many of them were written off 12 months ago as not good enough. Many current united players, at the time of purchase, were considered equal or better than their city counterparts. On paper, if you think back to just a few months ago at the beginning of this season, if you'd been told that list would start most games, would you have been concerned about City ? I'd bet not for most people - even now it doesn't look that good on paper, let alone before the first game of the season was played
But every single one of those city players in my list are right now playing the very best football of their career to date. How many United players can that be said about ? (genuine open question - I don't watch them enough to be sure. But I suspect very few ?)
Budget or not, I don't believe on paper the United squad was particularly inferior to the city one, at the time of purchase. So it's either buying the wrong players for the squad/system/manager, or they are being poorly coached. To look at how much United have spent in total on the current squad, or how much individually on the best players within the squad, and say it's because not enough money is being spent, doesn't seem right to me
