You've got £900m, nine summers and the benefit of knowing how the decade turned out. That sounds like more than enough. Then you look at the leaderboard and see runs at your club that won twice as much for less money. This guide covers the habits that separate those runs from the rest. None of it tells you who to sign. It's about how to think about the money.
Build an XI, not a collection
The single most important thing to understand: your team is your best eleven, plus a little depth. Every season the game picks your strongest XI on merit for your formation, from your signings and the club's own players. Three back-ups on top of that make a small difference, because they cover when someone's out. After that, extra signings add nothing.
So a squad of 25 signings is not twice as good as a squad of 12. A run that buys eleven genuine upgrades and three useful back-ups will beat a run that buys twenty-five decent players, and it will usually do it for less.
Two things follow from that:
- A signing only plays if he's better than the man he'd replace. Buying a midfielder who's worse than your club's third-best midfielder buys you nothing. At a big club that bar is high from day one. At a smaller club, almost anyone good is an upgrade.
- Think in positions. Before each window, ask where your weakest starter is. That's where the next pound should go.
The squad rules
You can hold up to 25 signings at once: at most 3 goalkeepers, 8 defenders, 8 midfielders and 6 forwards. You can sign and release in the same window, in any combination.
Releasing a player frees his place but not his fee. Money spent stays spent. He goes back to his real career, and his real club gets him back from the next season. That makes every signing a commitment, so don't buy players you plan to drop next summer unless the price is small.
Spend early, but not all at once
Transfer fees climbed steeply over the decade, and the market in the game follows them. In summer 2009, a player in the top 10% of the market cost around £6m. By 2016 and 2017 it was £13.5m. The top 1% went from about £28.5m to more than £53m. The same quality of player costs roughly twice as much at the end of the run as at the start.
A signing made in 2009 also plays for you every season he stays good. Buy a forward in 2009 and he can count for nine seasons. Buy the same quality in 2015 and you get three, at double the price.
That's a strong case for building your core in the first two or three summers. Most of the best runs we see spend a big share of the budget in 2009. But spending everything at once has a cost too:
- Players age. A 30-year-old bought in 2009 won't be much use by 2013. You'll need money then to replace him.
- Players arrive. The market each summer is the players at English clubs that season, plus anyone who really moved to England that summer. Some of the decade's best players weren't available in 2009 at any price. Leave room in the budget for them.
A sensible shape is a heavy first summer that fixes the XI, then smaller, targeted windows that replace whoever is fading.
Less can be more
On the leaderboard, ties on trophies go to whoever spent less. Your verdict at the end also counts the charges, and that number grows with every pound you spend.
So the best runs aren't just good. They're efficient. Once your team is clearly the strongest in the country, there's little to gain from spending more. There's a limit to how far above the real best side any team can go, so money spent past that point is wasted. The money you didn't spend is what wins a tie.
A simple plan for a first run
- Summer 2009: look at your club's real XI. Replace the weakest four or five starters with clear upgrades, younger rather than older where you can.
- 2010 to 2012: fill the remaining weak spots and add two or three good back-ups.
- Every summer after that: check who's getting old or who has fallen off, and replace them. Watch for players who only arrived in England that summer.
- Keep an eye on the total. If you're winning comfortably, stop spending.
Next, read where the bargains are in the transfer market and how age changes a signing's value.