Aston Villa in football's top 10 net spenders of the decade as Man United embarrassed

Aston Villa owners Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens are set to back Steven Gerrard in the summer transfer window with the club aiming to compete for European football next term.

Gerrard wants to add more quality to his squad in the coming months and will be handed the funds necessary to continue building his team. In January, Villa recruited Philippe Coutinho (loan), Lucas Digne, Calum Chambers and Robin Olsen to bolster Gerrard's squad in for the second half of the season.

But much like the first five months of the season, Villa have been on good runs of form and also very worrying spells too. Dean Smith was sacked for losing five in a row back in November, and the club are currently in their worst run of form since then, having lost four of their last five and are without a win in that time.

Though, the 0-0 draw at Leicester City - which was Villa's first draw on the road all campaign - did stop the rot, and ahead of the summer window, Gerrard, CEO Christian Purslow and sporting director Johan Lange want to end the season well to then attack a very competitive market.

And Villa's spending shows no signs of letting up, after owners NSWE have already spent over £350million on transfer fees alone since the club was promoted back to the top-flight in 2019. In fact, since the 2012/13 season, only eight clubs across Europe have spent more than Villa.

The CIES Football Observatory has recorded the net spends of clubs across Europe since the 2012/13 season and their results are staggering. In at number one and two are the two Manchester clubs, United and City.

Man United are the only club in Europe to have recorded a net spend of over €1billiion since the 2012/13 campaign, while City register a figure of € 984million,