Lucas Moura, Sao Paulo forward

After a rather unpleasant summer for United fans, seeing Chelsea and Arsenal make big moves in the transfer market, not to mention being told off by their equivalent of God, Fergie, whilst he was defending the Glazers – who of course have the best interests of the club at heart, clearly displayed by the plans to sell on the stock exchange and keep only half the money – such generosity knows no bounds, but things are looking up for fans, with the declaration that £50 million will be spent this summer to show the club still has intent and can compete with anyone in Europe.

Sadly for United however, in the modern game, like it or not, £50 million is not going to get you very much. It may buy you a leg of Messi, or perhaps a half of the duo that is Xavi and Iniesta – but at the absolute most, unless you are a wiz at bargaining or the club is in utter disarray like Malaga, you can get two world class players if you’re very lucky.

For a top, top player you are looking at going on £30 million – even the forgotten man Kaka and tug of love child Luka Modric are going for around that, and someone like Scholes in his prime would have exceeded that mark easily.

This is by no means a dig at United, in fact it is lamenting the price of players these days, and more than that the wage demands that come with them. It is not just the millions you are forking out for RVP, it is the couple of hundred thousand a week he demands on top of this.

Of course you can still get quality players who have the potential to become stars for just under big money – Kagawa is a little bit of an unknown quantity (obviously not to the people who claim to have watched the boy for years and know he is in no way a risk or unknown quantity – apparently he’s even better than Mata or Cazorla – there must be more Dortmund season ticket holders in England than we thought.)

For clubs who aren’t looking to challenge for the title, £50 million is a huge amount of money – just imagine what Moyes could do with that at Everton, or Valencia if they could buy a player instead of selling their star every summer, yet in reality for a world class player or to really overhaul a team, it is not that much.

Everything is obviously relative to the club you are talking about, and for one as big and with as stellar a reputation and manager as United, and one that needs a few players at that, £50 million really isn’t too big a deal. Perhaps if the Glazers hadn’t crippled the club with interest payments, there would be a larger amount in the transfer kitty and a longer run in the Champions League.

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