Ruben Amorim’s side spent well over £200 million and have one win from four games this season
After a net summer spend of €156 million (£134m), it should tell you all you need to know about the level of success Manchester United achieved in the transfer window that a 3-2 win over newly promoted Burnley thanks to a 97th-minute penalty was heralded as a major result.
That was their first victory of the 2025/26 season, one that prevented them going winless in August with only 31 hours remaining in the month. There will be readers who think handing this title to the Red Devils is just obsession, just the embodiment of ‘hated, adored, never ignored’ or just engagement farming because they’re one of the biggest clubs in the world.
After all, Wolves and West Ham appear to have set themselves up for a relegation battle by failing to adequately retool for the coming season while Fulham have literally signed two first-team players, one of them on loan, Crystal Palace were on the verge of losing two of their three best players and that fate did befall Brentford.
However, what sets Manchester United apart isn’t the fact that their articles (usually) get more readership than ones about Crystal Palace or Fulham, it’s the way so much was sacrificed at the altar of this summer of wastefulness and potential this transfer window held for Ruben Amorim. No other club has used their resources so poorly.
Squandered summer spending spree promises punishing 2025/26
Whatever your views on Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s impact on the Manchester United team, ignoring the actual product on the pitch it’s undeniable that he’s made the matchday experience worse for Red Devils supporters that bring children to matches, that are disabled, that hold season tickets and for the stewards in the terraces.
Sir Alex Ferguson has been distanced, Eric Cantona is so disgusted he’s become a member of FC United of Manchester. All of this paved the way for a summer of spending at Old Trafford, yet they’ve squandered all the apparent windfall from that hardship imposed on fans and ex-employees.
Amad Diallo and Bruno Fernandes were arguably Manchester United’s best players last season, and though Mason Mount’s impressive performances this August have surprised many, that trio would be a solid support act for Benjamin Sesko.
In the 2-2 draw with Liverpool, one of Amorim’s best results at the helm (it’s not a long list - he’s won four Premier League games in total excluding those against promoted sides), Amad and Fernandes were the key players for Manchester United but eight months later both are playing out of position to both accommodate two luxury purchases and fix problems that should’ve been solved in the transfer market instead.
Martin Zubimendi and Adam Wharton would’ve been a dream midfield in the 3-4-2-1, significantly improving the team for around the same cost as Cunha and Mbeumo while allowing the two best incumbent players to continue thriving in their preferred positions.
Both Cunha and Mbeumo have the potential to succeed at Old Trafford despite bumpy starts, the issue is they’re unlikely to have the same impact on the team as a more functional base would - the issue is the position Amorim was shopping for rather than the specific players at that position.
Sesko did at least fill a major need for Manchester United though the Slovenian is yet to start against opposition from League 1 or above and has failed to open his account in red yet - despite playing 90 minutes against a club that’s one twentieth of his personal transfer value. It’s a worryingly similar start to Rasmus Hojlund’s career at Old Trafford but you can’t judge a book by the first chapter. So it’s certainly to be confirmed whether either Sesko is a good signing on grass, but on paper he certainly made sense, which makes him an outlier.
Senne Lammens is also too early to judge but while a new keeper was a priority, signing a player on deadline day who was 22 when the window opened and has never played international football is a bit head-scratching when Emi Martinez, Mike Maignan and Gianluigi Donnarumma were among the potential options this summer and Amorim knew it was a position of need by the end of last season.
Chickens coming home to roost from Amorim’s divisive man-management
Amorim received plaudits for his no-nonsense and decisive handling of Marcus Rashford, Alejandro Garnacho, Jadon Sancho and Antony, but he’s reaped what he sowed this summer. Surprisingly, clubs aren’t that interested in shelling out mega bucks for players who their manager would rather pick his 63-year-old goalkeeping coach over than, or who they’ve told to pray they can find another club to sign them.
If Rashford and Garnacho had continued on their trajectories from 2023 or 2024, Manchester United should’ve been able to fetch around £150m for the pair this summer, instead instead it’s almost impossible they’ll even break nine figures. Garnacho’s transfer fee alone dropped by £30m after Amorim lambasted him - an amount that Ratcliffe would need to sack over 800 staff on the median north-west England wage to make up for.
And that’s ignoring Kobbie Mainoo, arguably the brightest of Carrington’s academy stars in the last decade. Having started every knockout game for England at the 2024 Euros including the final aged 19, Mainoo was a healthy scratch for Thomas Tuchel’s most recent squad and right now it looks unlikely he’ll even be on standby for the Three Lions at the next World Cup two years on - a damning indictment on Manchester United’s talent development.
Finally, this is a squad that ties the Red Devils to Amorim or a coach with a similar philosophy at least until January if not next summer, because of the way it’s cemented the squad’s inflexibility. Despite fans calling for a switch to 4-3-3, Amorim doesn’t have the players to adequately switch systems even if he wanted to.
While Sancho and Antony never lived up to the hype at Old Trafford, their loan spells at Borussia Dortmund and Real Betis show potential remains in both players and under the right coach they could’ve at least been dynamic impact substitutes and capable options behind Rashford and Garnacho - a pretty strong stock of wingers.
Now all four are playing their football outside of Manchester and if Amorim is sacked for a replacement who prefers playing with wingers, Ratcliffe will need to inflict more financial misery on staff and supporters to raise funds to purchase wideman of the same value, quality and profile that they’d already bought and developed in the last cycle.
Regardless of Amorim’s ability as a coach, this window could and should’ve been handled differently for the good of Manchester United in the short and long-term, instead they’ve repeated the same mistakes as the rest of the 12 years and manifested problems for whoever is in the dugout over the next two seasons.
They’ve spent a lot of money wastefully, sold a lot of talent cheaply and so in terms of performance against potential this summer that makes them the real losers of the transfer window.
Continue Reading