Manchester United have the most expensively assembled squad in world football, leading Real Madrid and cross-town rivals Manchester City, the latestresearch from the CIES Football Observatory has revealed.
The overall fees spent on the current squad at Old Trafford total€718m, a figure significantly inflated by the world record capture of Paul Pogba for around€100m alone this summer.
But the group also includes the likes of Juan Mata, Anthony Martial, Eric Bailly, Ander Herrera, Henrikh Mkhitaryan, David de Gea, and even Wayne Rooney, who were all bought for expensive fees at one time or another.
By comparison, Real Madrid's current squad, including two former world record buys in Cristiano Ronaldo and Gareth Bale, set them back€634m, while Manchester City's comes in at€611m.
After the top three there is a noticeable drop off to Barcelona with the fourth most expensively assembled squad, coming in at a buying cost of€485m. Chelsea have spent€481m to get their squad as it currently is, which is marginally more than Paris Saint-Germain.
Juventus, Arsenal, Bayern Munich and Liverpool round out the top 10, spending between€350m and€400m on their respective squads in the transfer market.
10 Most Expensively Assembled Squads in Europe's Top 5 Leagues:
What is equally interesting is how the wider figures show the sheerlevel of money flowing into English football, putting it streets ahead of Spanish, German, French and Italian in terms of what even middling and small clubs can afford to spend on players.
The overall study lists all 98 clubs in Europe's top five leagues and not a single Premier League side, even including the likes of Burnley and Middlesbrough, features outside the top 50 most expensive squads.
Tottenham, Everton, West Ham and Southampton are all in the top 20 ahead of the likes of Milan, Wolfsburg,Bayer Leverkusen and Sevilla, the latter two currently competing in the Champions League group stage.
At the very bottom of the pile, Angers, Sporting Gijon, Darmstadt, Osasuna, Metz and others all have squads assembled for less than €10m. By contrast, Burnley spent more than that on Jeff Hendrick alone over the summer.
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