A record spending spree by Premier League clubs in the summer transfer market passed the £1.9-billion mark before the window closed Thursday, with Manchester United, Manchester City, Liverpool and — belatedly — Chelsea all signing players to conclude the reshaping of their squads.

The headline transfer on a typically frantic final day of trading was the arrival of Brazil winger Antony at United from Ajax for £82.5 million, making him the fourth most expensive player in Premier League history and football’s most expensive deadline-day signing.

That took United’s total spend in this wildest of transfer windows to about £208 million — a figure only topped in the whole of Europe by Chelsea who finally signed an out-and-out striker in Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang from Barcelona. In the club’s first transfer window in the post-Roman Abramovich era, Chelsea spent £243 million.

Man City’s signing of Switzerland centre back Manuel Akanji for £15.2 million felt low-key by comparison, while Liverpool’s only move — the loan signing of Brazil international Arthur Melo from Juventus — was still significant as it strengthened the team’s injury-hit midfield.

Fuelled by income from huge global broadcasting deals worth about £10 billion over three seasons, Premier League clubs have reverted to pre-pandemic levels of spending, and then some, to leave the rest of Europe in its wake.

England’s top-flight clubs spent about the same on players as those in the top leagues in Spain (£435 million), Italy (£652 million), Germany (£422 million) and France (£470 million) combined, according to calculations by the Transfermarkt website.

The net spend of the Premier League teams was £1.17 billion, compared to Italy (£7 million) and Spain (£56 million). In France and Germany, the league actually made a profit according to Transfermarkt.

Summing up the outrageous splurge by English clubs was the business conducted by Nottingham Forest since securing a return to the Premier League for the first time after 1999.

Forest signed three players on deadline day to take its total number of incomings across the window to a remarkable 21, at a cost of £139 million.

— AP