Manchester United's Spending Struggles Under Michael Carrick

Manchester United are finally top of a table again under Michael Carrick – and this one actually matters. Since his appointment in January, no Premier League side has taken more points.

For more than a decade, though, United’s natural habitat has been a different leaderboard: the spending charts. They have usually dominated those. This summer, they slipped into unfamiliar territory.

When the window shut, United were lodged in the bottom half of the Premier League’s gross spenders, according to Transfermarkt. Around £148 million, potentially rising to £155m, went on midfielders. That was it for senior signings. No new striker. No extra left-back. Nothing else.

Across the league, the heavyweights opened the taps. Manchester City cleared £400m. Chelsea and Tottenham pushed past £300m. Newcastle, Aston Villa, Liverpool and Arsenal all sailed beyond £200m. United, stuck in 11th on the spending table, were outgunned by promoted Ipswich and Hull.

Old Trafford, on rations?

Carrick was never likely to take a swing at his employers. He chose his words carefully, but the gaps in the squad were hard to ignore.

“Certainly, the players that we've brought into the group, I'm absolutely delighted with,” he said. “I think we've done some really good business there for the quality and the level of player that we've got. You can always look at it, and there's other things you can do or possibly could have done.”

The last line lingered. United’s problem was not so much who they signed, but who they couldn’t.

On deadline day, they were offered Rayan Ait-Nouri on loan. They passed. Lewis Hall? Even if Newcastle had been willing to sell, United could not realistically join that bidding. The market had shifted, and they were no longer setting the pace.

Several long-running issues converged. One was familiar: United’s chronic failure to shift the unwanted. Manuel Ugarte’s World Cup injury was unfortunate, but it mattered. At the start of the summer, United could reasonably have expected decent fees for the Uruguayan, for Andre Onana, for Joshua Zirkzee. Instead, Zirkzee stayed, Onana went back to Trabzonspor on loan, and the hoped-for cash never arrived.

They may, in time, be relieved that Barcelona did not exercise their option to buy Marcus Rashford. The proposed £26m fee already looks like a relic from another era, and unlike others on the block, the Mancunian still has the talent to grow into a first-choice starter again.

Even so, the sums did not add up. United might have pencilled in an extra £50m, maybe even closer to £100m, in sales. In reality, the only major income was a deal arranged in 2025: Rasmus Hojlund’s move to Napoli. Strip that out and only Coventry brought in less from player sales.

Net spend tells a slightly different story. United sit higher there, with Villa and Chelsea actually turning profits and Newcastle flirting with one for much of the summer. Yet United feel like an outlier among the modern operators who buy and sell relentlessly.

They also look dated in another way. Transfer fees have ballooned into the absurd, and United, of all clubs, seemed caught out. Midfielders they liked – Elliot Anderson, Mateus Fernandes – suddenly went for huge money. United stepped back. They simply could not keep up with those auctions.

If this is United’s own version of a credit crunch, it is built on years of missteps. Heavy losses on the likes of Antony and Casemiro have finally bitten. Even last summer’s relative bargain, Senne Lammens, sits alongside questions over whether United overpaid for at least some of the £200m attacking trio of Bryan Mbeumo, Mateus Cunha and Benjamin Sesko.

The accounts tell their own story. Every year, the club lists the millions still owed to other sides in staggered transfer payments. On top of that come the annual interest payments on the debt loaded onto the club by the Glazer ownership. The past keeps dragging at the present.

Ruben Amorim’s short reign added another bill. Sporting CP received €11m in compensation when United hired him. United then had to keep paying the Portuguese coach even after his dismissal. Finishing 15th in the Premier League in 2025 slashed prize money. A season of only 40 games – out of the Carabao Cup at Grimsby under Amorim, out of the FA Cup at Brighton under Darren Fletcher – cut matchday and broadcast income further.

So this summer became a budget rebuild, at least by United’s standards.

Youri Tielemans arrived via a £35m release clause, a full £90m cheaper than Enzo Fernandez. Andrey Santos cost £77m less than his former Chelsea teammate, despite the Brazilian spending much of his time on the Stamford Bridge bench while the Argentinian started. Carlos Baleba, at an initial £65m, was the priciest of the trio, yet only the 10th biggest signing by a Premier League club in this window.

United, once the market’s loudest spender, now find themselves trying to climb back to the top of the only table Carrick cares about – while counting every pound in a league that no longer waits for them.