Leeds United have spent somewhere in the region of £100million in the transfer market following their return to the Premier League.
Chairman Andrea Radrizzani has been quick to sanction funds to help bolster Marcelo Bielsa's first-team squad at Elland Road, following last term’s promotion-winning campaign.
With Premier League status and a revenue stream that dwarfs anything the club have been able to dream of during their 16-year exile in the EFL, Leeds have been able to attract players and shop in markets that were previously inaccessible.
Not only have Leeds signed Spanish international forward Rodrigo Moreno from Valencia, breaking Rio Ferdinand’s £18m record that stood for nearly two decades, but they’ve also broken their previous record for a single summer window.
Even the outlay during the most reckless heights of the Peter Ridsdale era are a fraction of what the club have been able to spend this summer, which is in part thanks to inflation of the transfer market, as well as the revenue streams growing exponentially since Leeds were last in the top flight.
Marcelo Bielsa has been able to keep his promotion-winning squad together, with star men Helder Costa (£15m) and Illan Meslier (£5m) turning their loans into permanent deals, alongside a quartet of new first-team arrivals.
The club spent a combined £76m spent on the four new faces: Rodrigo from Valencia, centre-halves Robin Koch and Diego Llorente from Freiburg and Real Sociedad respectively, as well as a deadline day signing, Brazilian winger Raphina from Rennes.
There were also eight additions to the youth ranks following the academy getting upgraded to category one status. Joe Gelhardt (Wigan), Sam Greenwood (Arsenal) and Crysencio Summerville (Feyenoord) arrived with big reputations for not-inconsiderable fees.
In years gone by, Leeds have been required to balance the books by selling star players like Ross McCormack and Robert Snodgrass as well as academy graduates like Fabian Delph, Jonny Howson, Lewis Cook, Charlie Taylor and Sam Byram.
That’s not been the case after returning to the Premier League, with no player sales necessary to help fund the major £100m outlay.
There’s still time for some to be sold to EFL clubs, with Barry Douglas’ future up in the air, but it doesn’t appear Leeds will be getting much - if anything - in player sales this summer. The only departures so far are youth players either released or allowed to leave on free transfers.
In comparison, Premier League champions Liverpool were able to help offset the cost of a trio of new signings Thiago Alcantara, Diogo Jota and Kostas Tsimikas by selling the likes of Dejan Lovren, Rhian Brewster and Ki-Jana Hoever, bringing down their net spend to roughly £30m.
Almost all of United’s summer signings have officially been signed for undisclosed fees, meaning this isn’t quite an exact science and some of the figures might not be 100% accurate, especially when you factor in the complications of extra clauses.
But all of the figures below were reported at the time and believed to be in the region of what Leeds actually paid for them.
Here’s the full breakdown, leaving Leeds with an astonishingly ambitious net spend of £102.9m.
All Leeds United transfers in summer 2020 and what each deal is worth
Ins:
Hélder Costa - £15m
Illan Meslier - £5m
Rodrigo - £30m
Robin Koch - £13m
Diego Llorente - £18m
Raphinha - £15.4m
Joe Gelhardt - £900,000
Charlie Allen - £300,000
Cody Drameh- £1m
Dani van den Heuvel - Free
Sam Greenwood - £3m
Crysencio Summerville - £1.3m
Total: £102.9m
Outs:
Matty Downing - free transfer (Bradford Park Avenue)
Joe Stanley - free transfer (Buxton)
Joshveer Shergill - free transfer (Solihull Moors)
Harrison Male- released
Will Huffer - released
Kamil Miazek - released
Total: £0.00
Net Spend: £102.9m
