Meanwhile..

[Omegstrat6]

We've certainly had an unexpectedly good transfer window but elsewhere there are some interesting ones.

Down the road at Blues, they've splashed a League One record of £10 million to be reunited with Jay Stansfield. They now have some money behind them of course and the investment in both a new stadium and the current one demonstrates intent from the new owners and a belief in the medium/long term potential of the club but whilst I get why they would want Stansfield back, spending so much on one player when they could have spent the same amount on several to help strengthen their squad seems very strange.

As for Chelsea, who only in 2021/22 faced sanctions over breaches of FFP and declared losses of £901m in 2022/23, they brought in 8 new signings (including Fernandez for £105m) with only one departing on loan in January. They have now brought in 12 new players at a cost of £243m to boost their squad size to a mere 50! 😮 Aside from how they are able to do this, it also begs the question of why. One wag on the BBC comments section pointed out that the transfer window was not some kind of Panini sticker book with the aim of collecting as many players as possible regardless of whether you needed them or not 😀

[Omegstrat6]

Apologies-Chelsea have brought in 11 new players at about £230m not 12 and have seen 10 depart including Maatsen, Gallagher (surely over rated?) and Lukaku. Even so, their squad size is pretty big plus they have also been forced to sell some of their most promising academy players to fund the spend.

[Prando]

I don’t fully understand the intricacies of FFP. Is there a restriction on the number of players (rather than value) that clubs may put out on loan?
I seem to remember the allegation that Chelsea were buying players (to stop others) and immediately put them out on loan. Realistically there was no real intention of including them in their squad ! Seems outrageous to me.

[boingy]

42 in the squad at Chelsea. Loads can’t play and will end up being loaned out. I was half expecting we would have one!

[Omegstrat6]

My understanding is that the squad size for Premier League clubs ( that must be officially submitted after the transfer window closes) is 25 of which no more than 17 can be of non "home grown" status. However, players under 21 do not count so clubs can have as many of these as they like.

As for FFP, Premier League clubs have to submit accounts annually and cannot exceed losses of £105m over a rolling 3 year period. For the 2019/20-2021/2022 three season period, Arsenal, Wolves, Palace, Brighton, Fulham, Manure, Villa, Chelsea and Everton all exceeded this figure. Worst culprits were Manure (-£302m), Villa (-£306m), Chelsea (-£409m) and Everton (-£520.4m). Given the above, it seems unlikely that any of these last clubs will be able to turn things around over the recent 2022/23 and 2023/24 seasons yet only Everton seem to have been investigated (March 2023)? Shock 😲 eh? 🤔Not.

Chelsea, like others, apparently have been using "amortisation" to get around the regulations. Basically, they don't spend big in one go but spread the costs of their purchases over several years and it is these reduced annual repayment costs that are then used in the FFP calculations.

Man City have been reporting profits lately and whilst I'm sure no one doubts their ability to draw in more revenue than most this surely also smacks of a degree of "creative accounting". They were also the club, of course, that allegedly broke the FFP rules over 100 times since their introduction in 2009 over a 9 year period.

[Omegstrat6]

I don’t fully understand the intricacies of FFP. Is there a restriction on the number of players (rather than value) that clubs may put out on loan?
I seem to remember the allegation that Chelsea were buying players (to stop others) and immediately put them out on loan. Realistically there was no real intention of including them in their squad ! Seems outrageous to me.

Just looked up your query on restrictions on loan players Prando. Apparently, PL clubs cannot register any more than 2 players out on loan at any one time and the max number of loans registerable in one season is 4 with only one being allowed from the same club. My understanding is that these restrictions relate to just the registered 25 man squad however and that the rules for 2023/24 allow a total of 7 in and 7 out per club.