Manchester City’s transfer market moves over the coming month “may be the last chance to witness the spectacle of an English club spending a foreign owner’s money with unrestricted lavishness,” writes Richard Williams.
With everyone else feeling the pinch from the economic downturn (even Chelsea’s players now have to pay for their training-ground meals), “only the sovereign wealth of the royal family of Abu Dhabi is exempt, for the moment at least.” A few other clubs like Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur and Arsenal may be targeting individual purchases, but only City “can open a large-scale expedition into the January transfer market by spending £10m [$14.6m] on Chelsea’s 28-year-old reserve left back,” Wayne Bridge.
Bridge’s move may in future be seen as “the end of an age of gold, if not of a golden age.” The weak pound will diminish the EPL’s status as an attractive home for foreign players, and managers like Arsenal’s Arsene Wenger “may find that even his enlightened policy towards the education of young players is no longer enough to lure the most talented teenagers from around the world. Long excluded from such negotiations, Italy, Spain and even Germany will regain their place at the bargaining table.” What price the 39th game, he asks, when Cristiano Ronaldo has relocated to Madrid?