Barcelona Have Now Spent More In The Transfer Window Than Any Club Before

They'll be Arsenal fans about to tell me about net spend because that's the real quiz but either way no team has ever spent more in a season than Barcelona have now that Philippe Coutinho belongs to them.

Jose Mourinho recently talked about Manchester City spending 'striker money on full backs' but the truth is that Pep Guardiola's side barely spent more than one could expect in the current economics of transfers.

Virgil van Dijk's move to Liverpool just this month broke the record for the world's most expensive defender for the third time this season with Kyle Walker seeing his record price being overhauled just months after the move.

Sorry Kyle, you're still the most expensive full back ever at least. Image: PA Images.

Coutinho of course became the third most expensive transfer of all time following on from Neymar's move in the summer and Kylian Mbappe's move, which won't actually be official till the summer.

And Mbappe's deal not happening till the summer, he's currently only on loan at PSG, is very important to this article because Coutinho's £140 miillion transfer fee means no team has ever spent more on transfers in a season than anyone before:

Clearly the money spent by Barcelona is working as the Catalan side are above Real Madrid by 16 points in La Liga and ahead of second place Atletico Madrid by nine points.

That's pretty impressive when you consider that actually of all the money spent Paulinho has actually been the player to contribute most to their title aspirations.

Ousmane Dembele picked up a bad hamstring injury early in the season and was out for three months, only returning in the past week, whilst Coutinho is obviously yet to make his debut.

Even right back Nelson Semedo has barely played, starting just seven games in La Liga this term. Maybe it's proof that you don't really need to spend that much money when you've got Messi.

Who needs anyone else? Image: PA Images.

There's some very questionable transfer windows in there, especially Manchester United's transfer window from 2014/15 that was overseen by Louis van Gaal that's hardly set the world alight.

Angel di Maria was off not long after whilst fans are still waiting for Luke Shaw to fulfil his potential.

Will anyone ever beat Barcelona's record again?

Topics: Manchester City, Barcelona, Philippe Coutinho, La Liga

Ryan Sidle

Ryan is a writer for SPORTbible. He covers all sport from football, formula one, cricket, rugby, tennis, athletics, mma and wrestling. He obviously hates YOUR football team and has no interest in synchronised swimming.

@Sidler28