With the international break on and club football on a hiatus, it was time to look at how the exorbitant transfer spending in January by Premier League clubs has paid off in goals and assists.
Of course, this piece was inspired by Chelsea and Todd Boehly spending millions of pounds like pocket change and then nearly ending up with having prize signing Mykhaylo Mudryk getting the 007 nickname (he didn’t as he got an assist in his seventh appearance).
As we’re looking to add a pound value to each goal contribution, we sourced the transfer fee and loans with fee from Transfermarkt for each January 2023 signing made by each Premier League side. We then updated their goal and assists stats using OPTA and divided their transfer fee by their goal numbers and assist numbers to calculate the unit value. In case of a player not having scored a goal or provided an assist, then the value for that would be the entire transfer or loan fee.
Without further ado, here’s the table with each Premier League side’s January spending and the amount of goal involvements they’ve gotten with it.
| PL Clubs January Spending Per Goal Involvement | |||||
| Team | Total Spending (£) | Total Goals | Total Assists | £/Goal | £/G+A |
| Arsenal | 52214201.5 | 1 | 6 | 52214201.5 | 7459171.643 |
| Aston Villa | 26651445.7 | 0 | 2 | 26650541.62 | 13325270.81 |
| Bournemouth | 29622542.5 | 0 | 3 | 29621537.63 | 9873845.878 |
| Brentford | 884255 | 0 | 1 | 884225.004 | 884225.004 |
| Brighton and Hove Albion | 5305530 | 0 | 1 | 5305350.024 | 5305350.024 |
| Chelsea | 297281185 | 2 | 3 | 148640592.5 | 59456237 |
| Crystal Palace | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Everton | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Fulham | 8046720.5 | 0 | 1 | 8046447.536 | 8046447.536 |
| Leeds United | 36475518.75 | 0 | 0 | 36474281.42 | 36474281.42 |
| Leicester City | 27411905 | 1 | 1 | 27410975.12 | 13705487.56 |
| Liverpool | 37138710 | 4 | 0 | 9284362.542 | 9284362.542 |
| Manchester City | 9726805 | 0 | 0 | 9726475.044 | 9726475.044 |
| Manchester United | 2617394.8 | 3 | 3 | 872435.3373 | 436217.6686 |
| Newcastle United | 40322028 | 0 | 0 | 40320660.18 | 40320660.18 |
| Nottingham Forest | 19718886.5 | 1 | 1 | 19718217.59 | 9859108.795 |
| Southampton | 55929128.75 | 2 | 0 | 27963615.75 | 27963615.75 |
| Tottenham Hotspur | 7074040 | 2 | 1 | 3536900.016 | 2357933.344 |
| West Ham United | 10611060 | 2 | 0 | 5305350.024 | 5305350.024 |
| Wolverhampton Wanderers | 51684704.75 | 4 | 1 | 12920737.87 | 10336590.3 |
Which team got the best value in goal involvements from January transfers?
Manchester United, whose exorbitant transfer fees have been a cause of concern in recent seasons, have done good business in January, when you consider goal involvements.
The Red Devils spent about £2.6 million on a loan fee for Wout Weghorst as well as a straight loan for the likes of Marcel Sabitzer and Jack Butland.
That has yielded them three goals and three assists in January. The overall spending per goal involvement (goal and assist) from the Red Devils in January then has been approximately £436,000.
United are also the most economical when it comes to money spent per goal with an outlay of £872,435 per goal scored as Weghorst has scored two and Sabitzer has scored one for the Red Devils.
United are followed by Brentford, whose signing Kevin Schade has provided an assist. The team to have gotten the third-most per pound has been Tottenham whose signings Arnaut Danjuma and Pedro Porro have popped up with a combined two goals and an assist.
Who spent the most per goal involvement?
Unsurprisingly, it’s Chelsea who lead this metric.
They were very active in the market, spending a Premier League record amount on Enzo Fernandez and a sizable fee for the likes of Mudryk, Noni Madueke and others. Chelsea spent approximately £253 million in transfer and loan fees and that has yielded them two goals and three assists.
That means they’ve spent about £60 million per goal involvement and nearly £150 million per goal.
Following them is Newcastle who spent about £40 million on Anthony Gordon who is yet to score or assist for the Magpies.
Where do league leaders Arsenal rank in these metrics?
Arsenal were very active in the January transfer window. Despite missing out on top targets like Mudryk and Moises Caicedo, the Gunners were able to bring in alternatives like Leandro Trossard, Jorginho and Polish defender Jakub Kiwior.
The Gunners spent about £52 million (third-highest Premier League spenders) in the window for the three players and that has given them a goal and six assists.
Those seven goal involvements have all come from Trossard who has also been nominated for the Premier League Player of the Month award for February.
That also means that the Gunners have spent nearly £7.5 million per goal involvement. This is the seventh-lowest in the league.
When it comes to cost per goal, it is the second highest as they’ve only scored one goal. Had Jorginho’s strike against Aston Villa been counted as his goal and not an own goal for Emiliano Martinez, Arsenal’s ranking in this metric would have been around ninth or 10th.
Methodology
- We collected all January Premier League transfers and their values from Transfermarkt
- The stats for the January transfer signings for their new clubs were sourced from OPTA
- To calculate the money spent per goal and goal involvement (goals + assists), we divided the transfer fee by the respective numbers
- In case the numbers for goals/assists were zero, the entire transfer fee (or loan fee) was put in as the cost per goal/goal involvement
- We considered transfer fees for direct transfers and loans involving a fee
