Thursday, February 2

Stick your blue flag up your transfer window

Let's hope for the sake of football that West Ham beat Chelsea in our next home game. Chelsea have signed 17 players and spent a total of £550 million this season. Their gross transfer expenditure of £289 million in the window was more than all the combined clubs of La Liga, Serie A and the Bundesliga. Owner Todd Boehly's strategy is to use creative accounting to spread the cost of the deals over eight-year contracts (next season they'll only be allowed to spread costs over five years) and keep within the financial fair play rules. It's a risky game as you can end up with a lot of dud players on long-term contracts. Imagine if West Ham had signed Anderson, Haller, Hugill, Roberto, Ajeti and Jack Wilshere on eight-year deals... It's surprising to see Graham Potter mixed up in all this as at Brighton he was known for sensible management. His biggest problem will be keeping a massive squad happy. And the good news is that only 16 of them can play against the Irons.

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