Kaveh Solhekol shares significant Leeds January transfer update, details Bielsa budget
Leeds United manager Marcelo Bielsa spent his entire transfer budget for the season in the last transfer window, according to Sky Sports News journalist Kaveh Solhekol.
Speaking on Sky Sports News on Tuesday, Solhekol reported that “Bielsa is assessing his Leeds squad but the club spent their transfer budget in the summer window”.
He added: “At the moment, [there are] no current plans to add any new faces this month.”
No surprises there
Bielsa is not a fan of signing new first-team players in the January transfer window so there are no shocks at all that he and Victor Orta used up all their available funds in the summer.
According to The Athletic, Leeds spent £100million on new players in the last transfer window as the Whites welcome Helder Costa, Illan Meslier, Rodrigo, Robin Koch, Diego Llorente and Raphinha to Elland Road on permanent deals.
That was a lot of money to spend for a newly-promoted team so it’s no shock that there’s nothing left in the budget this month to improve the squad.
And if Bielsa does want to add new faces, it seems he’ll have to sell existing players in order to be able to raise funds.
Mirror journalist David Anderson has recently reported that Bielsa doesn’t plan to add to his squad in January unless he needs to “plug a hole in his squad like he did with [Kiko] Casilla two years ago”.
Based on this update from Solhekol, Bielsa won’t even be able to do that unless there’s a loan deal in the offing.
Leeds can sign one more Premier League player on loan so that is a likely course of action but, as Anderson said, it’s “highly unlikely” after the failure of Jean-Kevin Augustin last January.
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