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Football News: Manchester United; Have our UCL rivals moved ahead of us this winter?

Well there we have it, a huge non event that was the winter transfer window.

I've seen some complain that we didn't strengthen like our rivals, and this confuses me. As i wasn't aware that our rivals did really strengthen.

Chelsea sold Schurrle and loaned out Salah and brought in Cuarado.
First off Cuarado is a good player but not a world class one, he is marginally better than Willian and maybe slightly more suited to a Mourinho team due to his high work rate. But he isn't going to be better than Hazard on the other wing nor is he going to score vital goals when Costa is out.

Chelsea has two weaknesses and they are a lack of options upfront with Drogba and Remy being a million miles away from the level of Costa, and a lack of quality options at full back, Azpiliqueta and Ivanovic are good players but they need a genuine replacement for Cole at LB and should bring Ivanovic into the centre and have Azpiliqueta at RB as Filipe Luis isn't good enough to be first choice.

Niether of these weaknesses were addressed, so they are marginally better if at all, and besides they are challenging and will be probable league winners, and we aren't challenging so we aren't really in direct competition with them.

City have a couple of weak spots, mainly in defence and someone to replace Yaya when he's not about. They signed Bony a very good player imo, but not one that was needed, with Aguero the obvious first choice striker and Dzeko and Jovetic in reserve the Bony transfer makes little sense. He will probably come in very useful next season as i expect at least one of Dzeko or Jovetic to leave in the summer, but they are still at the club and again we have another "rival" who hasn't strengthen their weak areas just added more competition in an already strong area. And again we are maybe over stretching ourselves if we are honest if we are calling City a genuine rival this season.

City and Chelsea will fight it out for the title and we will fight it out with Liverpool, Arsenal, Spurs and Southampton for the remaining two champions league places. So lets see how our real rivals have strengthened this winter.

Lets start with Southampton, they managed to make Bertrand's loan into a permanent deal. Which is good for them but it hasn't made them a stronger team as he has already been at the club since the summer. Then the only other signings they made was Elia and Djuricic.

Elia is a useful player but a bit of a journeyman, he was lauded as a youngster but never lived up to his early promise. Since then he has moved from club to club to try and carve out a career for himself. He will add depth to their squad but won't really threaten the first team place of Tadic.

Djuricic is a player i suspect most haven't really heard of, in some respects you could read the same for his career as i wrote for Elia although Djuricic is a little younger so maybe still has a faint hope of living up to his early billing. But again this isn't a player who will push Ward-Prowse or Tadic out of the line up, but will soften the blow when they are unavailable. He really is the tradition punt, he could find his home at Southampton and become a good player for them or he could struggle to adapt much like he did in Portugal and Germany before.

Southamptons main triumph this winter window was actually not losing any of their key players, Clyne, Schneiderlin, Wanyama, Tadic, and Ward-Prowse have all been eyed by other teams so far this season, and keeping hold of them was imo Saints best bit of business this winter.

Spurs have had a similar window to us, they've cleared out some dead wood but their best bit of business was getting Harry Kane to put pen to paper on a new deal. Other than that they signed a talented young lad with potential in Dele Alli, but he is unlikely to be a key player for them in the run in.

Everton signed Lennon who will be useful to them and have probably done the best imo in adding someone who could have a real impact on their first team, but i still expect them to be some way off the UCL places come May.

Liverpool have signed no one, their form improves and now with Sturridge back they have someone who can finish the chances the create, its just a matter of how long they have him back for.

So now we find ourselves at Arsenal, a team who have had as bad an injury hell as us maybe even worse considering the lack of options in their squad. They have brought in a gamble in Bielik who could go either way, but in the short term will just add to the numbers rather than threaten the first team. Then we find ourselves at their key signing of the winter Gabriel Paulista a player who most didn't know about before this season, a player who has had something of a break out season in Spain but at 24 has been some time in the making. It is still unclear whether he will serious threaten the places of Mertesacker and Koscielny this season and again will more than likely be cover for them.

So in essence the teams around us have at best added to their squads with a look to the future and not strengthen their first teams this winter.

Everything points to a busy summer, if the club are prudent then they will be putting all the ground work in now so we can act quickly and decisively in the summer rather than end up duking it out over the scraps left toward the end of the summer window. For now the target remains the same as it has all season top four, and with the squad we have available in direct comparison to our rivals then we should be achieving that at least.

James "Shappy" Shapland

Written by James "Shappy" Shapland February 03 2015 12:10:55