Blues boss Mick McCarthy expects the Championship to be exciting but tougher during 2016/17 with plenty of money having been spent over the summer.
Town’s more modest fees paid for Adam Webster and Grant Ward have been somewhat put in the shade by some of the sums spent elsewhere.
"Newcastle seem to have bought everything, Trump towers, they’ve bought the lot,” McCarthy said.
"Wow, it’s going to be exciting up there, it is an amazing club and I think they’ve sold 40,000 season tickets.”
He says the Magpies' season will go one of two ways: "It won’t be dull, it’s going to be exciting, one way or the other. It can only be one or the other, that they don’t all gel and it’s not right or they just win the league by Christmas.
"I don’t know if [manager] Rafa [Benitez] has been watching the Championship and knows all the best players but he’s certainly signing the top players in the Championship, and you’d think they’d be a favourite to go up.
"Norwich have just spent £10 million on Alex Pritchard, who was going to Brighton first for £8 million, so that shows you the level.
"Villa have spent £12 million/£14 million on McCormack and there are other teams, Sheffield Wednesday have spent a lot of money and invested, Bristol City have.
"It’s going to be exciting, it’s going to be tougher, but we’ll be competitive as we always are.”
McCarthy believes plenty of those sides will be in with a shout of winning promotion: "Coming down you’ve still got the same players. Yes, you’ll invest a bit, Newcastle have almost signed seven players who you think would be playing who are used to being in the Championship and know it.
"Whatever Villa do, I don’t know ultimately. Whatever Norwich do, they’ve a lot of players who have been up and down, they’ve had a couple of years in the Premier League, up and then down.
"It really is tough for them, for players. They all want to be in the Premier League. We all want to be in the Premier League.
"I think Brighton will be competitive, who knows what Fulham will do with the money [for McCormack] when that comes along, they’ll invest that.
"Sheffield Wednesday will be competitive again, Derby. I don’t think it’ll only be two or three for the top two.”
He says there is pressure on the teams which have come down from the Premier League with the expectation that they’ll bounce straight back.
"With that kind of investment and the the type of players that they’re signing it’s almost like a responsibility to be in the top three or top six or top two for some of them,” the Town boss continued.
"And we have seen it, Derby have invested heavily and it didn’t work for them, they’re still in our league, despite all the money that people have thrown at it.
"There are more than three clubs throwing a lot of money at it, but there are only three clubs that are going to go up.”
Town will again be dark horses, which suits their manager: "When we finished sixth nobody expected us to do it and then, of course, there was a bit more pressure on [us last season].
""But we lost some really good players last year, our creative players and still finished seventh. It was seen as almost a negative and I don’t get that, to be quite honest.
"It’s not going to be any easier with all the money that’s been spent, players that are coming into the league, but there’s still that element of being organised, hard-working, very professional, sticking to your task and being a belligerent bunch of so and sos. And that’s what we intend to do.”
Is he at all envious of the sums of money other bosses have been able to splash out? "No, I keep telling you. I understand my job, my role and the players do and I think we do it well, to be quite honest. And we’ll be battling hard to rub a few noses in it. Like we always do.”