Transfer deadline day always means a lot of excitement and comes with either laughter, tears, relief or frustration. Premier League transfer spending this year has nevertheless been down from recent seasons but were still a lot higher than other big competitions in Europe, as the transfer window closed. English football clubs spent a total £1.218 billion, which means they’re about £158 million down on last year’s £1.376 billion. And that means that it’s finally time to make up the balance for this summer.
There were only 12 deadline-day Premier League signings, which is the lowest amount in recent seasons. This is clearly due to the uncertainty as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, but with the closed transfer window it’s finally time for clubs to look for a bit more stability and start to build their teams. All Premier League clubs have measured, cut, and fit in one way or another, so we thought we’d take a closer look at the best signings of 2020.
Everton’s Ancelotti is like a magnet
Everton’s transfer policy has made a significant upgrade since owner Farhad Moshiri started backing the club financially in 2016. The arrival of manager Carlo Ancelotti has not only given The Toffees a lot more strategic knowhow, it has also led to big players wanting to sign for the club. The Italian manager has impressively managed to sign Colombian’s number 10 James Rodríguez who we knew from his stay at Spanish side Real Madrid a few years ago, Brazilian midfielder Allan coming over from Napoli and Abdoulaye Doucoure making the same move from Watford. In addition to strengthening Everton’s midfield Ancelotti has also invested in young talents Niels Nkounkou (Olympique Marseille) and England under-21’s defender Ben Godfrey (Norwich City). The loan of Sweden’s international Robin Olsen from AS Roma needs to give some competition to goalkeeper Pickford, while high earning Theo Walcott left to Southampton. The successful transfer window has paid off so far as Everton’s topping the Premier League table with 7 wins out of 7 games which has made a lot of punters of bookmakers like NordicBet very confident about Everton, although the next game against Liverpool might be a tricky one.
Aston Villa: solid as a rock
Aston Villa has won all their 3 games played so far, making them the solid number two of the Premier League at the moment, just behind Everton with less games played. Ironically, Villa only managed to secure their Premier League ticket on the absolute final day of last season and this might have made them more eager to stay on top. Manager Dean Smith can therefore count on full support of the club owners giving him a few highly desired signings. The most remarkable signing of the summer was undoubtedly Ollie Watkins, bought from Brentford for a record deal of somewhere between £28 to £33 million, depending on his performances. Last season, Watkins scored 25 goals for his former club and is well known to manager Dean Smith. The striker has already shown his scoring ability with his magnificent hat-trick last weekend which contributed to the convincing 7-2 win versus Liverpool. Aston Villa also signed Emiliano Martínez, giving them more options in the goal. Something to note as well is that the most significant move of this transfer window might’ve been the one which saw Villa’s most important player and team captain Jack Grealish sign a new 5-year deal after ongoing speculation linking him with Solskjær’s Manchester United.
