Premier League: Transfer window proves richest ever at £870m

The summer transfer window was the richest in Premier League history as total spending for the calendar year reached £1bn for the first time.

Summer outlay passed £870m, 4% up on last the record set last year.

Manchester United's £36m signing of Monaco teenager Anthony Martial was the biggest deadline day move.

The biggest spenders, Manchester City, paid the two biggest fees, £55m for Kevin de Bruyne from Wolfsburg and £49m for Raheem Sterling from Liverpool.

Since the introduction of the transfer window system, gross transfer spending has exceeded £7.3bn, with over 80% of this being spent in summer transfer windows.

Who spent the most?

Kevin De Bruyne's move to Manchester City was the biggest of the transfer window

Manchester City broke their club record twice this summer to bring De Bruyne and Sterling to Etihad Stadium and help them become England's highest gross spenders in a single window.

Their total spend of approximately £160m beat the near £150m outlay of Manchester United in summer 2014, including deals for Fabian Delph, Patrick Roberts and Nicolas Otamendi.

The Premier League leaders were boosted this summer by having restrictions on their transfer spending lifted after meeting their Financial Fair Play target.

City's spending in 2014 was capped at £49m and they were also fined £16.3m for breaching Uefa rules.

The four Premier League clubs competing in this season's Champions League had a combined gross transfer spend of around £340m, representing around 40% of the aggregate gross transfer spend by Premier League clubs.

How the record was broken

The signing of 19-year-old Martial, Everton's £9.5m capture of Argentine defender Ramiro Funes Mori and Papy Djilobodji's £4m arrival at Chelsea from Nantes on Tuesday helped beat the 2014 summer window record of £835m.

Liverpool have used the Sterling money (and more) to sign seven players, with Christian Benteke (£32.5m), Roberto Firmino (£29m) and Nathaniel Clyne (£12m) the most expensive.

Manchester United have also been busy, spending £139m to bring in Martial, Memphis Depay, Matteo Darmian, Bastian Schweinsteiger and Morgan Schneiderlin, while Chelsea left it late in the window to conduct their serious business, signing Pedro, Baba Rahman and Djilobodji.

Newly promoted Watford have been the busiest club, signing 15 players.

What happened on deadline day itself?

West Ham were the busiest club on transfer deadline day but what else happened on Tuesday?

• Premier League clubs spent approximately £90m on deadline day, £5m more than last summer.
• Manchester United's £36m signing of Martial made the 19-year-old the world's most expensive teenager, with the fee potentially rising to £58m. He becomes United's third most expensive signing after Angel Di Maria (£59.7m) and Juan Mata (£37.1m).
• Other big-money signings on deadline day included Argentina defender Ramiro Funes Mori joining Everton from River Plate for £9.5m and Virgil van Dijk moving to Southampton from Celtic for £11.5m.
• West Brom turned down a fourth bid for Saido Berahino , causing the striker to suggest he may never play for the Baggies again.

Why are clubs able to keep spending?

The financial rewards of staying in the Premier League at the end of this season are immense.

Starting from 2016-17, the Premier League TV rights deal increases from £3.018bn to £5.136bn for three seasons.

The bottom club will pocket £99m per season with the champions earning more than £150m in prize money, even before extra money is paid for featuring in a TV match.

Alex Thorpe, senior manager in the Sports Business Group at analysts Deloitte, said: "This summer has seen another record level of transfer spending, as Premier League clubs continue to use increases in their revenue to invest in playing talent.

"With all 20 of the Premier League clubs now ranked in the top 40 clubs globally by revenue, we have seen clubs across the league compete successfully in the market for international talent. Premier League clubs' gross spending on players from overseas clubs this summer totalled more than half a billion pounds."

Where is the money going?

Total transfer fees paid to overseas clubs were £585m, about 10% higher than that seen in summer 2014. This was 67% of aggregate gross transfer spend by Premier League clubs, compared with 63% in summer 2014.

The Premier League clubs' net transfer spend of £460m – the amount by which outlay to Football League and overseas clubs exceeded their income from those sources – exceeded the previous record of £410m set last summer.

Thorpe added: "Looking across Europe, Premier League clubs' gross and net spending this summer is more than double that of any other European league. The driving force behind this is the growth and distribution mechanism of the league's broadcast rights.

"Earlier this year we reported the remarkable rebalancing of revenues and costs, such that Premier League clubs collectively generated pre-tax profitability for the first time since 1999, with clubs set to enjoy a further revenue boost when the next broadcast deals start in 2016.

"Therefore, despite a new record level of player transfer spending this year, collectively Premier League clubs have a chance to invest in playing talent while remaining profitable in a way that was previously not the case."

How much was spent around Europe?

Across the other 'big five' top divisions of Europe, the next highest spending league was Italy's Serie A, with a gross spend of £405m, followed by Spain's La Liga (£400m), the German Bundesliga (£290m) and Ligue 1 in France (£220m).

Golsicilia.it World Service's John Bennett said: "Serie A was incredibly busy this window but still produced less than half the spend of the Premier League, which is insane. Desperate to get back into the Premier League of European clubs, Inter brought in 15 players and AC Milan spent money on players like Colombian forward Carlos Bacca for £21m.

"There was also a huge amount of activity at Juventus, with around a dozen new faces heading to Turin. But the fans will be happier about the player the club decided to keep, in-demand France midfielder Paul Pogba, who was rarely out of the gossip columns throughout the window.

"Barcelona didn't let a transfer ban stop them from bringing in two new players but it was surprisingly quiet at Real Madrid where Mateo Kovacic and Danilo were the only relatively high-profile signings.

"And in France Marseille are the example of a club struggling to compete with Premier League money. They lost around nine established players, including Andre Ayew and Dimitri Payet to Swansea City and West Ham."

Who were the biggest net spenders?

Newcastle United emerged as the one of surprise biggest net spenders this summer – although that was mostly down to bringing in just £5.8m in transfer fees.

The Magpies spent around £47.8m on five new players, with Georginio Wijnaldum's £14.5m arrival from PSV Eindhoven their most expensive signing.

Every Premier League club spent more than they brought in, with Southampton the smallest net spenders at about £3.2m.

Who else in England spent heavily?

There was plenty of money spent in the Football League, with Championship side Derby spending £10m on midfielders Bradley Johnson and Jacob Butterfield from Norwich City and Huddersfield Town respectively.

Burnley, also in the Championship, spent £9m on Andre Gray from Brentford, while Middlesbrough spent almost £10m on Stewart Downing and David Nugent.

Football League clubs benefited from net transfer fees inflow of around £50m from Premier League clubs in the summer of 2015.

How social media reacted

• There were 1.1 million tweets about David De Gea in the final 24 hours before the transfer deadline.
• There were 34,071 mentions of Saido Berahino in the two hours after the West Brom striker posted his outspoken tweet – compared with 13,165 in the previous 10 hours.
• Manchester United (#mufc) were the most tweeted team, with 491,023 mentions in 24 hours, followed by Arsenal with 308,148.
• Heathrow Airport scored one of the most successful tweets of the day. Their picture of a map directing any potential new Arsenal strikers from the airport to the Emirates received more than 6,000 retweets.