Radio City News reported last week that Rafa Benitez will have £15-£20M to spend this summer plus whatever he can bring in through sales.
It’s not a fortune in terms of the competition we face from Man United, Chelsea & Arsenal so if its cloth-cutting time, how are we going to strengthen the squad and also bring in that world class player who will turn draws into extra wins?
I reckon we should sell Andrea Dossena and Philipp Deggen while they still have international reputations to help fund a swoop for Stewart Downing, depending on how that injury is.
He's not a world-beater but could definitely do a consistent job in the Premier League. We need serious competition on the left for the dangerous if inconsistent Albert Riera and if Ryan Babel is staying then that's not his best position.
Hopefully that would leave cash available for somebody else exciting up front or maybe on the right wing, giving Dirk Kuyt more chance to compete for his place through the middle (when we play 4-4-2?).
Martin Kelly has just been chosen to play for England under 19s so I wonder if he's ready to be our 4th choice centre-back. It would also be a real bonus if Stephen Darby is now up to giving the dependable Alvaro Arbeloa genuine competition at right-back.
Maybe Deggen is the competition that we need in that position but we haven't seen enough of him and can we trust him to stay injury-free?
Sometimes you just have to cut your losses when something doesn't work out (I'm not sure if Robbie Keane would agree though).
Lucas Leiva has improved lately but we should move him on particularly if Jay Spearing can take over his job as back-up in centre-midfield.
Maybe the sale of both of these players could finance a deal for the versatile Gareth Barry who'd be much cheaper than he was when we came so close to signing him last season.
The classy Xabi Alonso should definitely stay, he's earned his plaudits but we need extra strength in depth to be able to make this next step.
We'd know exactly what we'd be getting from the two players I've suggested and they would add some of that depth to the quality of our squad while hopefully only costing around the same as what we're able to recoup from the sale of some of our current squad who cover similar positions.
Don't get me wrong I'd much sooner be talking about bringing in Lionel Messi but that's not going to happen.
We've also got to start thinking about UEFA's restriction on the number of non-English players in the longer term.
Remember, we were forced to leave Sami Hyypia and Emiliano Insua out of our Champions League squad this season.
Naturally the Premier League comes first in the list of our priorities but it wouldn't be good for continuity if we had to chop and change squads, particularly towards the end of the season when we're hopefully in the hunt for both of the two biggest prizes.
The three local young squad players I've mentioned featured only briefly this season, being given substitute appearances as we qualified in the Champions League.
Using them more regularly as cover might be a gamble we're forced to take if we want to spend really big money on buying just one attacking player to help fire us to next season's Premier League title.
While it'd be unfair to say Damien Plessis or David Ngog have let us down, it'd also be right to say that we're looking for a bit more from our fringe players.
The rest of the squad has proven this season that they are up to the standard required.
We're probably going to have to sell Babel who I think has had his chance (but would still command a sizeable fee) and possibly even a very unlucky Yossi Benayoun to help pay for the likes of David Villa but now is the time to go for it.
He's the type of quality we need and we don't want this summer to turn into another missed opportunity like 2002 when serious errors were made with our transfer budget following a very promising runners-up finish.
It’s taken a long time for us to recover from that.
One thing's for sure, our main rivals will be spending big money in the search for class to strengthen themselves this summer and while we can take pride and confidence from what we've achieved in the Premier League this season, now is not the time for complacency.
The next couple of signings will be a massive factor in determining whether we can finally regain what we all really want most.
The two strongest transfer rumours have been for Villa and Carlos Tevez. I'm hardly giving any secrets away there, am I?
At least the talk is of attacking players of proven international standard and not the likes of El Hadji Diouf, Salif Diao and Bruno Cheyrou.
Rafa has said he has to be almost perfect in the transfer market this summer - cute and clever - and as usual he's right because we'll surely have to beat this season's excellent points total if we are to be 19 times Champions this time next year.
My own feeling is that this season has been a necessary learning curve on the way to the title (like what Man United themselves went through in 1991/2) and that we really are on the brink now.
It’s not a fortune in terms of the competition we face from Man United, Chelsea & Arsenal so if its cloth-cutting time, how are we going to strengthen the squad and also bring in that world class player who will turn draws into extra wins?
I reckon we should sell Andrea Dossena and Philipp Deggen while they still have international reputations to help fund a swoop for Stewart Downing, depending on how that injury is.
He's not a world-beater but could definitely do a consistent job in the Premier League. We need serious competition on the left for the dangerous if inconsistent Albert Riera and if Ryan Babel is staying then that's not his best position.
Hopefully that would leave cash available for somebody else exciting up front or maybe on the right wing, giving Dirk Kuyt more chance to compete for his place through the middle (when we play 4-4-2?).
Martin Kelly has just been chosen to play for England under 19s so I wonder if he's ready to be our 4th choice centre-back. It would also be a real bonus if Stephen Darby is now up to giving the dependable Alvaro Arbeloa genuine competition at right-back.
Maybe Deggen is the competition that we need in that position but we haven't seen enough of him and can we trust him to stay injury-free?
Sometimes you just have to cut your losses when something doesn't work out (I'm not sure if Robbie Keane would agree though).
Lucas Leiva has improved lately but we should move him on particularly if Jay Spearing can take over his job as back-up in centre-midfield.
Maybe the sale of both of these players could finance a deal for the versatile Gareth Barry who'd be much cheaper than he was when we came so close to signing him last season.
The classy Xabi Alonso should definitely stay, he's earned his plaudits but we need extra strength in depth to be able to make this next step.
We'd know exactly what we'd be getting from the two players I've suggested and they would add some of that depth to the quality of our squad while hopefully only costing around the same as what we're able to recoup from the sale of some of our current squad who cover similar positions.
Don't get me wrong I'd much sooner be talking about bringing in Lionel Messi but that's not going to happen.
We've also got to start thinking about UEFA's restriction on the number of non-English players in the longer term.
Remember, we were forced to leave Sami Hyypia and Emiliano Insua out of our Champions League squad this season.
Naturally the Premier League comes first in the list of our priorities but it wouldn't be good for continuity if we had to chop and change squads, particularly towards the end of the season when we're hopefully in the hunt for both of the two biggest prizes.
The three local young squad players I've mentioned featured only briefly this season, being given substitute appearances as we qualified in the Champions League.
Using them more regularly as cover might be a gamble we're forced to take if we want to spend really big money on buying just one attacking player to help fire us to next season's Premier League title.
While it'd be unfair to say Damien Plessis or David Ngog have let us down, it'd also be right to say that we're looking for a bit more from our fringe players.
The rest of the squad has proven this season that they are up to the standard required.
We're probably going to have to sell Babel who I think has had his chance (but would still command a sizeable fee) and possibly even a very unlucky Yossi Benayoun to help pay for the likes of David Villa but now is the time to go for it.
He's the type of quality we need and we don't want this summer to turn into another missed opportunity like 2002 when serious errors were made with our transfer budget following a very promising runners-up finish.
It’s taken a long time for us to recover from that.
One thing's for sure, our main rivals will be spending big money in the search for class to strengthen themselves this summer and while we can take pride and confidence from what we've achieved in the Premier League this season, now is not the time for complacency.
The next couple of signings will be a massive factor in determining whether we can finally regain what we all really want most.
The two strongest transfer rumours have been for Villa and Carlos Tevez. I'm hardly giving any secrets away there, am I?
At least the talk is of attacking players of proven international standard and not the likes of El Hadji Diouf, Salif Diao and Bruno Cheyrou.
Rafa has said he has to be almost perfect in the transfer market this summer - cute and clever - and as usual he's right because we'll surely have to beat this season's excellent points total if we are to be 19 times Champions this time next year.
My own feeling is that this season has been a necessary learning curve on the way to the title (like what Man United themselves went through in 1991/2) and that we really are on the brink now.
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