I remember thinking when we'd won the league that our ambition should be to establish ourselves as the Leverkusen, Villarreal or Atalanta of the Premier League. Established top half sides that regularly qualify for Europe, built on foundations of a strong academy and positive connection between supporters and heirarchy. There's no reason this couldn't have been achieved, particularly after we'd built on 2016 by qualifying for Europa and winning the FA Cup.
"There's no way we can compete with Man City, Liverpool etc" is a total straw man argument - no one thinks we can or should be trying to compete with them, but there's a level below that that is achievable for clubs of our stature and recent history.