With the clock ticking ever closer to 14th August and the first day of the 2010/11 Premier League season, a scan through BBC Sport, then a quick glance at Sky Sports News and there’s still no transfer update for Spurs, or pretty much anyone else for that matter. I somewhat naively didn’t expect it to be as quiet as this; I’d envisaged my team Tottenham Hotspur, fresh from securing their place in the Top Four – along with the rest of the Premier League – to be pursuing anyone who managed a five-yard pass in South Africa, or any player whose name could be heard over the vuvuzela howl.
The reality has been much different. Manchester City, who have embarked on a spending spree a convention of WAGs would have been proud of, have been the exception. The remaining clubs (even Chelsea whose £17 million on Ramires is a comparable drop in the ocean versus summers gone) have exercised a lot more caution with the threat of the recession still ringing in their ears; and a look to the south coast at Portsmouth’s predicament leaves little room for imagination when it comes to the dangers of reckless spending.
The Manchester City piggy bank has been busy
From little Blackpool, preparing themselves to dine with English football’s elite for the very first time, arguably weaker now than when they first secured promotion on a sunny May afternoon at Wembley, right through to Manchester United whose acquisition of a couple of starlets (Smalling and Hernandez) will hardly send tremors around the football world. Reality has well and truly hit home and things are very different. Where once heart ruled the mind in pursuit of “living the dream” (the words of former Leeds chairman Peter Risdale), nearly bankrupting many a club, now it is first and foremost a case of thrift and caution.
Whilst the new squad rules (25 players must be named, including eight home-grown players) mean clubs like Manchester City will have to offload players the calibre of Craig Bellamy, or risk them not even being granted a squad number, and in spite of James Milner’s possible transfer to City pumping £20+ million back into the market, the carefree cheque-signing culture for the vast majority is a distant memory.
Modern day football for once has been humbled.
By David Gerty on August 6th, 2010
Tags: Barclays Premier League, Football
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