I am in complete agreement that Woodward and everyone else up top have completely effed things up since they took charge and SAF left. It's a disaster and they deserve all the criticism they receive for what they've done. That said, I think this window was probably managed better than almost every other window in the last couple of years.
Like it or not, 7 years of gross incompetence has taken its toll and fundamentally changed what type of club we are. We're a club that makes money like it wins league titles but we are a 6th place club on the pitch...at best. It sucks but that's what happens when you have 7 years of transfer history that more or less reads like a used piece of toilet paper. Given that's who we are now, no truly established elite player is going to come here unless you throw gobs of money at them. And we've seen how that works...it doesn't. Because while elite players want to get paid they also want to win and play in elite competitions. 7 years of mostly failure have proven that they can't do that here. So yeah, maybe you convince one or two to come here by adding a 0 to their current paycheck but in the long run, if they aren't committed to the team and the cause, they are going to fail. MLS learned that (for the most part) and it seems like someone at United has finally learned that (probably Ole).
So if you rule out overpaying for established, capable of winning the league talent because their heart isn't in it, you're left with either A) trying to find the potential for that level of talent outside of your team that no one knows about yet or B) trying to find that the potential for that talent from within. Seems to me that A is very hard to do given the sophistication of scouting networks now. Not impossible but challenging unless you have a top notch operation and United don't anymore...at least not relative to their peers. B) is a lot easier and has saved United from the abyss once before. Hopefully it can do it again though there are certainly no promises.
Anyway, when you look at United's window, who they got and who they were linked to...I think it makes sense. I would have loved to added talent to the midfield but does anyone think Bruno Fernandes is a can't miss talent that can lift us into the top 4? Not saying it's impossible but he's about to be 25 years old and has had exactly 1 stellar season and 1 pretty good season for a team in a league that is nowhere near the quality of the EPL. So he's neither a young potential talent or an established league winning talent. I can see why no one would want to pay 70 million for him. Harry Maguire and AWB should make the backline immensely better. They seem to actually want to be here.
