Liverpool officials may be forgiven for feeling a little smug when day one of pre-season begins at the AXA Centre on Monday.
As the summer transfer window goes on in the background, the Reds will be able to largely take a watching brief from here on in as the chaos continues.
Having already signed Darwin Nunez, Calvin Ramsay and Fabio Carvalho before resolving the long-standing issue of Mohamed Salah's contract, those at Liverpool will be able to watch the show unfold as their rivals continue to be stuck knee deep in various transfer-related sagas.
For Chelsea, their efforts to restructure an attack that has already had well over £200m spent on it since 2020 goes on. The Londoners may have missed out on a deal for Richarlison after the Brazilian traded Everton for Tottenham Hotspur, but they are still in the hunt for Leeds United's Raphinha and, most interestingly of all, Raheem Sterling of Manchester City.
The £97m deal to bring Romelu Lukaku to Stamford Bridge last year is one that must surely go down as the worst of the Premier League era. The Belgium international was supposed to be the catalyst for a title charge, but he was out of the team by December and fluttering eyelashes in Inter's direction by giving unsanctioned interviews to Italian media.
Under new ownership, Chelsea are yet to make a significant splash in the market and have much work to do before the deadline at the end of August. That owner Todd Boehly has appointed himself as an interim sporting director, despite having no experience of such a specialist role, perhaps does not augur well.
The bulk of Manchester City's work appears to be done on the incoming front with Erling Haaland set to give Pep Guardiola's men a new dimension next term, but reports continue to link them with Brighton left-back Marc Cucurella.
The most intriguing part of the champions' work, however, particularly from a Liverpool perspective, is the quality of players they could lose before the season begins. Gabriel Jesus is on the cusp of a switch to Arsenal, while Sterling is attracting interest from Chelsea. Bernardo Silva is another who has been linked with a move away, with Barcelona, despite their well-documented financial plight, said to want the midfielder.
In an era where the smallest margins decide where the Premier League title heads, Liverpool will be keen to see how City cope with the potential loss of three important squad members for the forthcoming season and how their subsequent replacements fare.
But it is Manchester United where most neutrals are diverting their eyes towards this summer after they hit the reset button once again by taking on Erik ten Hag as manager in the wake of the miserable failure that was the short-lived Ralf Rangnick experiment.
On Saturday, it was revealed that Cristiano Ronaldo no longer sees his future at Old Trafford and wants to move to a club in the Champions League to continue at the elite European level before he eventually calls time on a lengthy and decorated career.
At 37, the Portugal international wants to be playing in the Champions League and while United have apparently told of their unwillingness to allow Ronaldo to leave, it's certainly an unwanted headache for new manager Ten Hag and Richard Arnold, who has stepped into the role as CEO that was vacated by Ed Woodward.
Like Chelsea, United have yet to do any significant business this term and while Tyrell Malacia of Feyenoord is close to completing a £13m switch, it is once again the high profile figures who the Red Devils are having trouble luring to the club.
Their interest in Barcelona's Frenkie De Jong has been long-standing and well publicised, but there appears to be little progress on that front after weeks of links to the Netherlands midfielder. Like Jadon Sancho, Raphael Varane and Harry Maguire before De Jong, United find themselves once more embroiled in a lengthy pursuit of a big-money target.
Should United agree to Ronaldo's apparent request, they will find themselves in need of replacing their top scorer from last season at a time when several high-profile centre-forwards have already moved on themselves this summer.
Liverpool, in stark contrast, operate in a much more efficient and quiet manner where their key targets are concerned. It took less than a week to bring Luis Diaz to Anfield at the end of January once it became clear that Tottenham had made their own interest known.
And the potential club-record outlay for Nunez last month was wrapped up swiftly when it became clear that Sadio Mane was destined for Bayern Munich. Sporting director Julian Ward flew out to meet his Benfica counterparts last month to conclude a deal worth an initial £64m within days of it being known that the Uruguay striker was the No.1 choice to replace Mane.
It was Liverpool's decisive movements last month that enabled them to beat United to the signature of Nunez. With both the Red Devils and the Reds interested in the Benfica striker, the FA and League Cup winners moved quickly to win the race after Jurgen Klopp identified him as the man he wanted to lead the line next season.
That particular deal, it is understood, owed a lot to Ward's contacts in Portuguese football, and once it became clear Liverpool had won the race for Nunez, it was widely reported from several journalists close to the United camp that they didn't want to enter into a bidding war for the 23-year-old striker.
By that point, however, Ward and his team were already convinced they had signed Nunez and the new man will report for pre-season duty next week as he gets a first taste of Liverpool life.
The unpredictable nature of the transfer window will continue for the best part of two months yet, but Liverpool's early work will ensure they can watch it with their feet up for the most part.
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