Man City spending under Pep Guardiola: How transfers compare to rest of Premier League 'big six'

Ah, so moneybags Manchester City and their chequebook manager Pep Guardiola are up to their old tricks again.

Antoine Semenyo through the door for £62.5million from Bournemouth. Will he even play? They've got two world-class players for every position. They're probably just buying him so other teams can't have him.

Maybe Marc Guehi as well this month? Honestly, Guardiola's answer to every bit of trouble is just to ask Sheikh Mansour for another sack of money. Sure, Ruben Dias, Josko Gvardiol and John Stones are all injured, and he recalled teenager Max Alleyne from a loan spell at Watford to make his Premier League debut against Brighton this week, but how many centre-backs does this madman want?

MORE: Why Man City signed Antoine Semenyo: Can £62.5m star reignite Guardiola's Premier League title bid?

To be clear, the above is a sarcastic compilation of some of the talking points around Manchester City's spending and transfer policy. A lot of them are little more than bad-faith arguments and/or the hot air of interaction farming.

At the same time, the nature of City's Abu Dhabi-led ownership means that their spending since September 2008 and the transformative effect it has had on the club is essentially an unprecedented tale in English football. This is before we consider the yet-to-be-resolved case of the Premier League, City and those 115 charges.

As such, Semenyo or any other big City transfer will tend to spark a different sort of conversation to those that take place when other big Premier League clubs splash the cash. So how does City's spending compare to other big hitters in England's top flight?

Man City

Man City transfer spending under Pep Guardiola

After Pep Guardiola's first nine seasons in charge of Manchester City, beginning in July 2016, the club had spent £1.94billion on transfers, as reported by the Swiss Ramble after City released their financial results for 2024/25. Following the summer arrivals of goalkeepers James Trafford and Gianluigi Donnarumma, which were not included in these numbers, Semenyo's signing takes Guardiola's City outlay beyond £2bn.

Last season was City's biggest spend of the Guardiola era, although the signings of Rayan Cherki, Tijjani Reijnders and Rayan Ait-Nouri in the additional window prior to the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup featured in these numbers, along with City's spending in summer 2024 and an uncommonly busy January 2025. It came to £353m overall.

Last winter, Guardiola added Omar Marmoush, Nico Gonzalez and Abdukodir Khusanov to an injury-hit squad that had fallen out of the Premier League title race after a largely inactive summer 2024, when Savinho and the returning Ilkay Gundogan were the only major first-team signings despite Julian Alvarez's club-record departure to Atletico Madrid. Vitor Reis and Juma Bah also joined, each of whom are now out on loan at Girona and Nice respectively.

Man City spending under Pep Guardiola season-on-season

*Numbers via The Swiss Ramble

The 2024/25 outlay was the second time Guardiola's City spent in excess of £250m in a season, following £328m in 2017/18, when the likes of Ederson, Kyle Walker, Bernardo Silva and Aymeric Laporte were recruited and formed part of the nucleus of Guardiola's first great side in England. Those two seasons are the third and fifth most lavish in English football history. Chelsea have the top two spots and are way out in front with £745m in 2022/23 and £553m in 2023/24. Manchester United's £343m in 2024/25 split their rivals' two entries in the top five.

Man City spending and net spend compared to Premier League rivals

This summer, it was Liverpool, with their British record additions of Florian Wirtz and Alexander Isak, who took the headlines rather than City. Arsenal have also spent big and astutely to give Mikel Arteta a squad that looks ready to become Premier League champions.

Guardiola is often at pains to point out that his club are not the only ones spending money, and the numbers below back up his point. City certainly have a spending capacity most other clubs could only dream of, but they are not English football's biggest spenders over the past five years.

Premier League biggest gross spend (2020/21 - 2024/25)

*Numbers via The Swiss Ramble

If we frame this in terms of net spent over the same period, City come off even better, ranking on a par with Liverpool and below the other four member of the so-called 'big six'. Along with the record sale of Alvarez, the regular income from the sales of prime youth academy products has certainly helped City in this regard.

Premier League biggest net spend (2020/21 - 2024/25)

*Numbers via The Swiss Ramble

Although endless headlines are generated by transfer fees, there is a greater correlation between wage bills and winning major trophies than the link between transfer outlay and success.

Here, City come out on top in the Premier League, as shown by the below table covering the Guardiola era. City are currently the biggest spenders on wages in the Premier League, with only Arsenal having a bigger percentage increase since 2019, a point at which the Gunners were spending £83m less on wages annually.

At various points, Liverpool (2017/18 and 2021/22) and Manchester United (2017/18, 2018/19 and 201/22) have spent more on wages than City annually, but Guardiola's squad has been the best paid in the division since their 2022/23 treble campaign. Their wage bill has fallen slightly in the past two seasons, although arrivals of Donnarumma's stature are likely to halt that trend.

Premier League wage bills from 2016/17

*Numbers via The Swiss Ramble

In summary, City spend an awful lot, giving them a competitive advantage over most teams in the Premier League and Europe. However, the numbers above show that the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea and Manchester United are more than capable of competing, with huge outlays of their own on transfers and wages. The real difference over the past decade has probably been Guardiola rather than his chequebook.