Leeds’ place in the below table compiled by football finance expert Kieran Maguire sheds light on why the club found itself in dire straits during the early 2000s, after expending tens of millions on players, which at the time represented a sum in excess of the club’s earnings.
Maguire described the table as such: “Inflation (using revenue as a measure of changing purchasing power) adjusted record transfer spending per season.”
Here are the 20 teams to have spent the most on players in any given Premier League season since 1992/93, adjusted for 2024 inflation.
7. Manchester City: 2008/09
IN: £469.7m (Shaun Wright-Phillips, Jo, Tal Ben-Haim, Vincent Kompany, Pablo Zabaleta, Robinho, Wayne Bridge, Craig Bellamy, Nigel de Jong, Shay Given) | Getty Images
8. Manchester City: 2017/18
IN: £446.0m (Bernardo Silva, Ederson, Kyle Walker, Danilo, Benjamin Mendy, Aymeric Laporte) | Getty Images
9. Newcastle United: 1998/99
IN: £430.6m (Duncan Ferguson, Silvio Maric, Nolberto Solano, Didier Domi, Didier Hamann, Stephane Guivarc'h, Laurent Charvet, Georgios Georgiadis) | Getty Images
10. Chelsea: 2023/24
IN: £411.7m (Nicolas Jackson, Christopher Nkunku, Lesley Ugochukwu, Axel Disasi, Robert Sanchez, Moises Caicedo, Romeo Lavia, Cole Palmer) | Getty Images for Premier League
11. Chelsea: 2017/18
IN: £394.7m (Alvaro Morata, Willy Caballero, Olivier Giroud, Ross Barkley, Emerson Palmieri, Antonio Rudiger, Tiemoue Bakayoko, Davide Zappacosta, Danny Drinkwater) | Getty
12. Leeds United: 2000/01
IN: £390.7m (Rio Ferdinand, Olivier Dacourt, Mark Viduka, Dominic Matteo, Robbie Keane) | Getty Images