Udinese have 5th lowest wage bill in serie A and only have 1 player on 1 million euros a year. They are legitimately smaller than most championship clubs. But in my opinion they are EXACTLY what epl clubs should do. However in my opinion the english clubs generally have no vision or ability to think outside the box. EPL clubs earn a fortune, even the smarter ones, but they don't invest properly.
Honestly, i can look at major league baseball in usa, which has a complete capitalist system, and you have teams like yankees and red box with payrolls at $200 million, yet they don't win every year, and teams like my oakland a's can compete with payroll at 40-50 million. Teams like Tampa bay who have 50-70 mil pay roll beat them at times. Because of superior scouting and thinking outside the box. Finding players different ways etc. (Really, everyone should read the book moneyball, it's the ultimate business book "the air of winning an unfair game")
If I ran an epl club, first thing I'd do is hire up and coming scouts/agents, guys like damien comolli is, but 3-4 years ago (before name is built), I'd invest HEAVILY in development, hire a coach who can develop players. I'd invest heavily in all assets of making players coming in adjust; translators, etc. This sort of investment is REALLY inexpensive when you consider cost of 1 domestic player is 10 milliuon pounds.
I'd scout DIFFERENT places. Yes you can go to brazil, france, spain, england and find next wonderkid, and if he's good, you won't get him cause he's going to a top club, so you're set with there second rate players. But random south american countries, eastern european, african, you can find VERY good players for fees consistently under 5 million euros. You can offer them lower wages because they are typically making less than 100k a year. And you can sell off the ones who are big time and fund more transfers or keep them.
Seriously udinese has 7 players who could play for ANY side in the world. Di Natale, Sanchez, Inler, Asamoah, Zapata, Isla, Armero could walk into all top 4 sides. Maybe some would be just squad status, players like Inler, Isla, Sanchez would be more. Go look at what udinese paid for them. Sanchez- 3 million dollars from colo colo after he showed real promise in copa lbertadores. He might be most expensive behind Inler. Fuck look at palermo who took two very quality players from slovenian league (both of whom chelsea want) for a grant total of 2 million euros, possible les?? It's only because they are connected with right agents. Something the right club managers and money can get. The stuff EPL clubs COULD do if they hired right people and built right way.
Tell me what's a better model for a mid table/lower table side? That or spending 25 million pounds on 2 random epl playerS?
