Wednesday 02 September 2026 12:50 pm
| Updated:
Wednesday 02 September 2026 12:52 pm
Emersonn was among six players who cost Ipswich £20m or more this summer
Promoted teams have followed Sunderland’s example and gambled big money on staying up after Ipswich Town, Hull City and Coventry City all ended the transfer window among the biggest net spenders.Manchester City, Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur might have led the way in gross outlay but in net terms many of the biggest spenders were those who returned to the top flight this summer, figures from multiple sources show. Ipswich’s £193m net spend was behind only Liverpool, while Hull’s £161m and Coventry’s £133m also placed them in the top five, according to Valuball, the database created by football finance expert Kieran Maguire.Alternative figures compiled by Transfermarkt have Ipswich third behind Spurs, with Hull and Coventry in the top seven. Either way, the trend is clear: clubs are increasingly willing to gamble on wholesale changes in order to stay up.Promotion to the Premier League is worth around £200m in revenue uplift in the form of far bigger central distributions and staggered parachute payments in the event of relegation back to the Championship.
