Excellent [£44.5m]
Daniel Sturridge - 12mil
Philippe Coutinho - 8.5mil
Simon Mignolet - 9mil
Mamadou Sakho - 15mil
Squad Players [£28m]
Xavi Hernandez - 15mil
Kolo Toure - free
Luis Alberto - 6mil
Tiago Ilori- 7mil
Poor [£22.9m]
Fabio Borini - 10.5mil
Oussama Assaidi - 2.4mil
Samed Yesil - 1mil
Iago Aspas - 9mil

Not sure how others interpret this table but looks like more misses than hits to me. Quality doesn't go with cheap that's for sure.

Spent more money on bargain bin buys but unfortunately most of the team failed/yet to establish themselves. Can't see why scouts have to swallow the cat when the eventual decision comes from the gaffer himself?

We can't add Keane and Aqualani to the comparisons because those players were bought much much later. We need to look at how Rafa did in his first 1 and half seasons. The bolded names were brought in as senior players, the rest were for Rafa's youth team.

Josemi    £2,000,000  26 July 2004
Antonio Nunez    £1,500,000  17 August 2004
Xabi Alonso    £10,700,000  20 August 2004
Luis Garcia   £6,000,000  20 August 2004
Mauricio Pellegrino   Free  5 January 2005
Fernando Morientes   £6,300,000  13 January 2005
Scott Carson    £1,000,000  21 January 2005
Boudewijn Zenden  Free Transfer  Free  4 July 2005
Pepe Reina   £6,000,000  4 July 2005
Antonio Barragan  £240,000  4 July 2005
Momo Sissoko   £5,600,000  14 July 2005
Peter Crouch  £7,000,000  20 July 2005
Miki Roque  Lleidav  Unknown  15 August 2005
Jack Hobbs  £150,000  18 August 2005
Besian Idrizaj  £190,000  22 August 2005
Mark Gonzalez  £1,500,000  20 October 2005 - He won't be able to play until the 06 season.
Paul Anderson  Swap              1 January 2006
Jan Kromkamp  Swap    4 January 2006
David Martin  £250,000   12 January 2006
Daniel Agger  £5,800,000 12 January 2006
Robbie Fowler  Free           27 January 2006