You can say that about all the top clubs, no-one's really spending much at all this summer.
This PSR bullshit here and high prices are scaring off teams not only here, but all over Europe too.
That’s mainly because for more than a decade the PL has been the source of ‘cascade’ funding across the European leagues.
That is, PL spending injected cash in to other clubs in other leagues to yet spend at other clubs in other leagues who spent that at other clubs in other leagues, and so on. As PL spending retracts, the cascade effect weakens considerably, as well, and we see far less spending outside of the PL (and in it, buying surplus PL players, which causes further retraction).
The Saudi spending spree partly made up the shortfall last season, but that well is slowly drying up, too, as players have a better understanding of what moving there means for their careers (and personal situations).
The other top five European leagues who have historically spent fairly large sums in the summer transfer windows are largely skint now, especially in France and Italy, and that has had a big impact on their spending over the last decade. Both Ligue 1 and Serie A are actually in pretty dire financial positions currently, with some drastic fixes being proposed to avoid potential collapse of many of the clubs in the coming years.
In some ways this is a return to a more sane market, given the TV money—the main inflator of transfer fees and wages, despite claims it was City—was never going to see exponential growth forever, but it is also a sign of two main factors:
1) the PL has partially broken the market with it’s dominance (and now passivity due to many factors, including PSR)
2) the market itself, particularly outside of the PL, is largely in a very, very precarious place after the Pandemic
The next decade will likely see a big shake up in the status quo across Europe as clubs try to restructure (often through sales/acquisitions) to become actually sustainable enterprises.
