Well we did, we signed Dahoud who was by and large fine, albeit not amazing, but after his red card against Sheffield RDZ didn't want to play him anymore. Whatever happened there is not really down to the recruitment team.
Caicedo was signed a good year and a half before his debut, Mac Allister was similar, Bissouma had a few games early under Hughton but also took a couple of seasons at least. The most complete DM we have bought in the premier league is Gilmour and he was only a bench player for the first 30...
I really must have been watching a different game to everyone else as I thought Peupion was one of the bright points in the first half. Playing out of position he took up good spaces, good control of the ball, simple passes, played a couple of nice one-twos with Fati, good play to get that...