I think the question is what do you expect as of today, and what is the long-term plan. Right now the club needs to stabilize and Dyche is doing a phenomenal job of that. If we are ever to become a top club again, well then we need capital.
Of course we can manage to reach the top 10, if we had not had the points reduction we would have only been 6 points behind Newcastle, and if we had been able to afford players with slightly better quality than at present I am sure that Dyche would have achieved a top 10 position .
But again, in order to regularly be a top club you must have capital, and in addition a dose of competence, not waste the capital on expensive players who have peaked and are prone to injury, or blow the salary budget on mediocre players. A bit like how Manchester United have operated, and we under Moshiri.
Manchester United and ten Hag are an interesting case. Here they have employed a manager who in the Netherlands stood for offensive and expansive football. In PL, on the other hand, you struggle to understand what he wants with the team. The problem is, of course, that in the Netherlands he had players who were generally much better qualitatively than the opponents, and the task mostly consisted of breaking teams down.
In addition, Ajax had good finances and a lot of expertise within the club. At Manchester United, he faces competitors who are stronger and faster, and the same approach that was taken in the Netherlands does not work to dominate in the PL. He realized this quite clearly, and walked away from many of his principles. Unfortunately, there wasn't much substance beneath the surface.
Of course you have clubs like Brighton, who play great (but fairly predictable) football. This is a well-run club, and one that performs above expectations. Last year they had their best season, 6th place and 62 points. That is 3 points more than we had with Ancelotti - then it was enough for 10th place. But it is quite obvious that Brighton, without any major investment, has reached its ceiling. The question is whether, in the long run, they will be able to replace the players who leave for bigger clubs. I think their success is temporary at best.
We all want entertaining football, but we also want success. Entertaining football is subjective, but for me entertaining football is a team that dares to take risks, and that wants to play forward and not sideways and backwards. Teams that give the players freedom, and that don't constantly repeat patterns. It must be something unpredictable.
Teams that are aggressive and constantly want to win the ball. However, if you don't have the fastest, strongest, most technical and creative players, then you will end up like Kevin Keegan. Even Guardiola considers himself a defensive coach, a coach who first and foremost wants to minimize risk, but he does so primarily through the team's technical superiority.
Any good manager will do just that, that is, set up the system and tactics according to the players' best qualities. Not like Lampard, tell Gana, AD, Tarkowski and the rest of the players, go out and express yourselves, create triangles and all the world's geometric shapes to outplay the opponent. A good manager would focus on what to do without the ball, and how to hurt the opposing team when they are off balance and at set pieces. That is what Dyche does. (Too long to read, I know)