Ed Woodward;United planning to reduced transfer activity

Manchester United executive vice-chairman Ed Woodward has suggested there will not be a repeat of the extravagant spending of the last two summers as the club said their wage bill is set to rise by almost 20 percent this season.

"We have seen a large number of ins and outs in the last two summer windows," Woodward said in a conference call to Wall Street analysts. "We were used to more modest numbers. Maybe we will go back to more normalised numbers."

Head of corporate finance Hemen Tseayo added: "We expect total staff costs to be up in the high teens in percentage as a result of Champions League participation."
Tseayo said the club had a net spend of £97m on transfers in the last financial year and, if there are no more signings or sales, it will be £78m in the next set of accounts.
"We incurred around £97m in net player cap ex [capital expenditure] and for fiscal 2016 we are committed to around £78m," he added.

"I would expect they spent within the rules," he said. "The rules are very clear, everyone understands them and there are some big revenue increases down the path.
"When you buy a player, it [the fee in the financial accounts] is spread over the length of a contract by amortisation. It doesn't surprise me there has been some material investment in players."
UEFA relaxed its rules on FFP this summer, but Woodward said the governing body is still committed to the cause.
"Is it still important? Yes, absolutely," he said. "There is still significant discussion in UEFA about financial fair play being important. There is still great belief in UEFA."