We might not have any competitive football for nearly three months, but the off-pitch manic-manoeuvres of many of the Premier League teams satisfies at least some of our football cravings whilst we patiently wait for the season to get up-and-running again. But is there a danger that we’re getting slightly too caught up in the blockbuster arrivals and shocking exits that vastly change the way we view certain teams?

We all love to try and predict the outcome of a new Premier League season, such as which teams will fare much better and which teams are destined to slide down the table, But when trying to tap into our very murky crystal ball, it’s hard not to get swayed by the transfer business that a club has conducted in the off-season. But when analysing the last summer transfer window of the Premier League, there seems to be every inclination telling me that it might matter a lot less than we actually think, at least in the short-term.

Some of the clubs we said had ‘won the transfer window’ or ‘improved massively’ ended up having dismal seasons whilst teams we viewed as having porous windows and not upgrading in the areas they needed to went on to have much better campaigns than the year prior. Using media such as articles, blog pages and Youtube videos, I’ll be exploring the five worst and five best publicly received transfer windows of the 24/25 season and seeing how each club consequently fared over the next 9 months. By the end of this article, you may have noticed a couple of key trends that may stop you from under/overestimating a club’s following Premier League season.

‘Winners’ of the 24/25 transfer window:

West Ham

Key signings: Max Kilman, Crysencio Summerville, Niklas Fullkrug, Aaron Wan-Bissaka, Guido Rodriguez, Carlos Soler

Key departures: Said Benrahma, Timo Kehrer, Divin Mubama, Flynn Downes, Nayef Aguerd

How easy we forget. Many people, had poised West Ham as the outright winners of the 24/25 transfer window. With their two starmen in Jarrod Bowen and Mo Kudus staying put and having ‘finally’ secured a prolific centre-forward in Fullkrug, fans were expectant that the Hammers could trump their 9th place finish of the 23/24 season. But as we know, the arrival of Julien Lopetegui dismantled any roaming optimism of West Ham fans within the first few months and many of these signings were never able to get off the ground due to injuries or because they were ill-equipped of meeting the ferocious demands of the Premier League. This coupled with seasons to forget from Kudus and Paqueta meant that instead of building on the promising signs of 23/24, West Ham sunk to 14th in the table and the club with supposedly the best transfer window had one of the worst campaigns of all the Premier League teams.

Fulham

Key signings: Joachim Andersen, Emile Smith Rowe, Sander Berge, Reiss Nelson, Ryan Sessegnon

Key departures: Joao Palinha, Tosin, Jay Stansfield, Tim Ream

Fulham invested strongly in the summer of 2024 with signings Joachim Andersen and Sander Berge being seen as shrewd replacements for Tosin and Joao Palinha. This prem-proven transfer strategy was further exemplified by the pickups of Reiss Nelson and Smith Rowe, with the latter being many fans’ favourite signing of the whole window. People hoped that in a new environment, the former England international would be able to get back to his flying best, carrying Fulham up the table towards European football in the process.The result wasn’t quite as pleasing as many had theorised. At one point Fulham were hovering around those European spots, but they gradually fell down the table to finish 11th with Smith Rowe’s injury woes from his last few years at Arsenal following him to Craven Cottage. Still a 2-place improvement on what they achieved in the season before, Fulham’s 24/25 season can be seen as one of steady progress but it was nothing to really write home about.

But as we will see soon, this is actually one of the better outcomes.

Brighton

Key signings: Georgino Rutter, Yankuba Minteh, Mats Wieffer, Brajan Gruda, Fedri Kadioglu, Matt O’Riley

Key departures: Deniz Undac, Pascal Groß, Billy Gilmour, Adam Lallana

The Seagulls’ summer of 24 was one of uncharacteristic heavy-spending. Brighton splashed €281.45 million in total on a wide range of young and very promising players whilst simultaneously introducing the youngest manager in Premier League history to England. It was a time of excitement but also uncertainty because no one really knew how Hurzeler and these new additions would get on. Unfortunately, both O’Riley and Kadioglu were sidelined with injuries early on into the season whilst Gruda and Wieffer struggled to adapt to life in England and found themselves constantly on the bench due to Brighton’s large squad. Although Rutter and Minteh showed heaps of promise and Hurzeler’s men looked like the real deal at different points of the campaign, the 24/25 season will be looked at as one of learning the ropes of the league and adapting on the go from both the manager’s and players’ perspective.

*Matt O’Riley in training: Image via @OfficialBHAFC on X*

Brighton’s overall inexperience meant that although they finished 8th, 3 places higher than the year before, the expectations of European football weren’t met. But you can argue the Seagulls were relatively unlucky as most underlying metrics had them as around the 6th or 7th best team in the league.

Manchester United

Key signings: Lenny Yoro, Manuel Ugarte, Joshua Zirkzee, Matthijs De Ligt , Noussair Mazraoui

Key departures: Scott Mctominay, Mason Greenwood, Aaron Wan-Bissaka, Jadon Sancho, Raphael Varane

We have ourselves to blame. How many times are Man United going to fool the masses before people eventually clock that they might not be as clued up as we think? The 24/25 summer was INEOS’ first window at the helm of the biggest club in England. Along with the dizzying decision to keep Ten Hag as head coach, United splashed heavily on players who either weren’t good enough for the level they wanted to be at, or were just too young.

But many fans thought this was the start of a new era at Old Trafford as the club could kick on from their emphatic win over Man City in the FA Cup. With ‘certain’ pundits placing the Red Devils in UCL spots and the Athletic claiming the summer 2024 window was the ‘best of any Premier League club’, little did they know what was in-store for the 13 time Premier League winners.

Man United proceeded to prove the doubters right and forgettable campaigns from Ugarte, Zirkzee and De Ligt in tandem with the managerial fiasco that dominated the headlines for weeks meant that United went from 8th in 23/24 to a shocking 15th. Fans were blinded by the big names and forgot to apply context to what was actually going on in the background. Easily forgiven, but still funny to look back on.

Ipswich

Key signings: Sammie Szmodics, Jack Clarke, Jacob Greaves, Dara O’Shea, Liam Delap, Omari Hutchinson

Key departures: Gassan Ahadme

Of the promoted sides, Ipswich were the one most highly anticipated. Fighting off advances from top sides for manager Kieran Mckenna was huge for their hopes of staying up. The arrivals of youth stars such as Omari Hutchinson and Liam Delap and securing some of the Championship’s best talents like Jack Clarke, Jacob Greaves and Sammie Szmodics, meant that if any promoted team was to beat the drop, most fancied this Ipswich side. They had spent heavily to basically construct a new XI fit for the Premier League.

But unfortunately for the tractor boys, they weren’t really ready for the jump to the Premier League. Ipswich’s lack of Premier League experience saw some players who made the step from the championship struggle to adapt to the top-flight. Promising seasons from Delap and Hutchinson weren’t enough and Ipswich were relegated without really putting up much of a fight.

It was too much too soon for Kieran Mckenna’s men who endured back to back promotions on their way to prem and perhaps it was naive of us to think a team filled with footballers who made their name in League 1 and the Championship, were ever going to be able to meet the level of the Premier League.

‘Losers’ of the transfer window:

Newcastle

Key signings: William Osula, Lloyd Kelly, Odysseas Vlachodimos, Lewis Hall

Key departures: Elliot Anderson, Yankuba Minteh, Miguel Almiron

The (many) critics of Newcastle’s transfer window suggested that they hadn’t strengthened anywhere near as much as they should’ve considering the fact they dropped 3 places to 7th in the 23/24 campaign. The loss of dynamic upcoming talents in Minteh and Anderson due to PSR issues meant a dark cloud had already been cast on St James’ Park before a ball was even kicked and Toon fans were filled with reluctant pessimism.

But Newcastle’s lack of investment seemed to actually benefit them across the 24/25 season as the squad was able to work together to become an outfit stronger than the sum of their parts. The team was packed with talent across all areas of the pitch, from Isak to Guimaraes to Hall Tonali to Livramento, there was more than enough quality for them to compete for Europe, especially with no midweek fixtures. But the short-sightedness across the majority of us meant when we saw little money being spent, we instantly feared the worst.

I guess the moral of the story is that in some cases it’s best to work with what you’ve got and get the utmost best out of the tools you have at your disposal, instead of doing anything rash. I’m sure if the PIF had the money to spend, they would’ve brought in a host of new players, but there’s no guarantee it would’ve led to a higher placed finish than 5th.

Everton

Key signings: Jake O’Brien, Iliman Ndiaye, Tim Iroegbunam, Jesper Lindstrom

Key departures: Amadou Onana, Neal Maupay, Ben Godfrey, Lewis Dobbin

Cast your mind back to 12 months ago and there was a growing band of Everton fans who were increasingly worried that the Toffees weren’t going to be playing their first season at the Hill Dickinson in the Premier League. Season after season they had just about avoided the drop and after this transfer window, many expected the Merseyside club to be battling it out near the bottom of the table once again.

Everton, due to crippling club debt manufactured by themselves, hadn’t been able to give the squad the overhaul it so desperately needed. The signings of O’Brien, Ndiaye and Lindstrom were viewed as promising but not enough to significantly carry them up the table and the sale of their best player Amadou Onana was a huge cause for concern.

Although Ndiaye impressed from the jump, Everton were one point above relegation by time Dyche was given the sack. Moyes came in and instantly the tides changed, if it weren’t for the miracle-working coach, this may have been the year the Toffees’ recent history of poor spending finally caught up to them.

Wolves

Key signings: Andre, Rodrigo Gomes, Carlos Forbs, Pedro Lima, Jorgen Strand Larsen, Tommy Doyle

Key departures: Pedro Neto, Max Kilman, Daniel Podence, Fabio Silva

We’re starting to notice a theme here. A summer handicapped by spending restrictions accompanied by the exits of your best players, Wolves’ 2024 transfer window was viewed as the worst of all the Premier League teams, most fans were convinced they’d be relegated and again it took a managerial change to steer them out of the mess they were in.

For Wolves it’s like deja-vu. Two of their most important players left in Neto and Kilman and people thought they weren’t adequately replaced. Under Gary O’Neill, they were defensively abysmal and seemed to get battered every other week, conceding by far and away the most goals in the league and sitting at 19th in the table.

But again, was this result of a bad window or was O’Neill just ill-equipped to deal with these players? Vitor Pereira seemed to get a tune out of the same Wolves side so what do you put the emphasis on?

Perhaps we should try to separate the players brought in from the manager. Because worst comes to worst and the coach is sacked, he may be replaced by someone better at dealing with the squad at his disposal. But we can’t pretend like this window was good either, another one which was glaringly obvious at the time, Wolves can just be thankful they eventually got it right halfway through the season.

Liverpool

Key signings: Federico Chiesa, Giorgi Mamardashvilli

Key departures: Adrian, Fabio Carvalho, Sepp van den Berg

For Liverpool it was a similar situation to that of Newcastle’s. Only one first-team signing alongside Klopp’s underwhelming final year at Anfield had people worried for Arne Slot. However, his and Michael Edward’s decision to just work with the talent already in the squad and the Dutchman’s intelligence to just tweak a few areas of Klopp’s philosophy to his fancy, meant that a Liverpool side who were were relatively unchanged from the year prior, could hit the ground running from day one and not look back.

I, like basically everyone else, didn’t expect the Reds to win the title but now in hindsight it makes sense why they were substantially better than the chasing back. Cohesiveness and continuity spearheaded by one of the strongest cores in Europe - the only unknown quantity was the Dutch boss who quickly showed us why Liverpool recruited him in the first place.

I know it’s a lot easier to say in hindsight, but sometimes we just need to step back and look at what’s staring us in the face. Liverpool had the money yet chose not to spend it, why could that have been?

Leicester

Key signings: Oliver Skipp, Bilal El Khannouss, Facundo Buonanotte, Jordan Ayew, Issahaku Fatawu

Key departures: Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, Kelechi Iheanacho, Dennis Praet, Harry Souttar

Most fans with a keen eye were quick to dismiss Leicester’s chances of surviving in the Prem after the window they had. Although the Foxes had managed to tie down Fatawu on a permanent deal and secure the signatures of exciting attackers Buonanotte and El Khannouss, Leicester lost both their head coach and manager to Chelsea early on in the season. This severely halted any of the momentum that they had built up during their industrious 23/24 campaign in the Championship and a reliance on Jamie Vardy to still be their main talisman even though he was pushing 40, gave many people the impression that Leicester weren’t here to stay.

It appears for promoted sides, the most important thing you can do is keep a hold of your most coveted employees. Whether it’s your best players or your coaches, it’s a necessity to continue to build on what you did in the season prior because starting again as a promoted side in the hardest league in the world, is an incredibly tough ask.

The takeaways

So what can we learn from these 10 different case studies? Firstly, a window is never as good or bad as we think it is. If a team signs 5 or 6 players you believe are all fantastic, there’s an extremely slim chance that all of them will hit the ground running. Injuries and adjusting to a new league stifle the progress of so many new signings and so we must be careful not to get ahead of ourselves when consequently trying to predict where a team will finish.

Another thing is that the clubs we often give the title of ‘winning’ the transfer window funnily never seem to have as good of a season as we think. It was West Ham last year, Brighton the year before and Spurs the year before that. All teams that had very disappointing campaigns relative to what the expectations were. As I said before, we as fans tend to get very excited by the names and numbers. Lots of money spent for players we think are great and instantly that’s an 9/10 window when maybe the actual 9/10 is the club who only signed one or two squad players because their team didn’t actually need any upheaval. Sometimes the best possible thing is continuity and trusting the players who got you into this position, rather than ripping up any trees.

I also tend to feel we dramatise the effects of a club’s best players leaving. It was panic stations when Wolves sold Neto and Kilman, fans were certain they’d get relegated. When Onana left Everton, the Goodison Park faithful were worried about the implications this may have on their season. But both teams fared relatively well at the end of the day in 24/25 and I think when we focus too much on one or two players leaving, we forget just how much quality there is in a Premier League squad. Recruitment across the 20 teams has got substantially better since the introduction of things like data analysis and often one player’s exit can be masked by the signings of 2 guys in that position who combined, do the same job.

How many times does a team get relegated purely based on the transfer window they’ve had? Alternatively, when was the last time a team brought in a whole host of new players for big money and were virtually improved overnight?

The transfer season is exhilarating but as I’ve said, sometimes we can get caught up in the excitement. When looking at most improved sides each season, or the teams who stumbled down the table during a Premier League campaign, their transfer window was often a tiny reason for this. If you see your club hasn’t significantly invested this summer, don’t worry because chances are you aren’t as doomed as you think you are and on the flipside, if your club has spent relentlessly over these past months and your squad looks in so much better shape, there’s a plethora of things that still need to go right for vast improvements to be seen. Typically, it’s what a club has meticulously built over the last years that finally clicks and provides vast improvements.

A transfer window can move you up and down the table by two or three places, it won’t completely change the fate of your club for the foreseeable future. Shiny, new toy syndrome doesn’t apply in the Premier League.

How much does the transfer window actually matter?

European players to watch: Part 4