The Political Economy of Football V2

My large family displays no interest in football, the one exception being a son-in-law who is a Southampton season ticket holder.   I have not intruded into private grief but his wife tells me he will not discuss Spygate. The following material extracts highlights from the Swiss Ramble’s latest review of the club.   Much more in depth analysis is available on his Substack page. Southampton had long been held up as an example of a club punching above its weight, finishing in the top eight four seasons in a row during their 11-year stay in the top flight, but went down in 2022/23, finishing in 20th place. The relegation in 2022/23 took place in the first full season under the control of Serbian media mogul Dragan Solak, who bought 80% of the club for £100m in January 2022 via his investment vehicle Sport Republic Limited.   However, the rot had already started to set in after Chinese businessman Gao Jisheng acquired a majority stake in 2017, with Katharina Liebhe...

Alongside the finalists, the New York Times estimates four other clubs broached €100m (£86.6m) in prize money this season: Bayern Munich, Liverpool, Atletico Madrid and Real Madrid. Prior to 2024-25 there were only 25 instances of clubs topping €100m in UEFA earnings; using our figures, 13 clubs in the past two seasons have done so. Only two English clubs landed in that category this season but Premier League sides, unsurprisingly given there were six of them, hoovered up the most money of any one country. We estimated those six — Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchester City, Newcastle United and Tottenham Hotspur — have earned a combined €591.5m (£514.8m) from this season’s competition. The next highest national cohort, five teams from Spain, have received over €200m less.

National League North side South Shields have been taken over by a group of international investors led by Jason Ye:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9we09dzxpzo A graduate of New York University, Ye obtained his law degree at Rutgers.  His links with South Shields are obscure. Jason was selected to the 2020 New York Metro Corporate and Securities Law “Super Lawyer” Rising Stars list. Jason currently sits on the Alumni Steering Committee of the Rutgers Center for Corporate Law and Governance. An expert on China-related capital market matters, Jason has been invited to many speaking engagements globally and quoted on numerous occasions by major media outlets in the U.S. and China. 

For a club that has won more La Liga and Champions League titles than any other team on the planet, the past two seasons have been disappointments for Real Madrid, which finished behind arch rival Barcelona in the Spanish league standings in back-to-back years and crashed out of European competition in the quarterfinals each time. Yet for all of the hand-wringing among the team’s exacting fans, business has never been better for Los Blancos. During the 2024-25 season, Real Madrid posted $1.27 billion in revenue, up 12% from its mark the year prior, already a record for a soccer club. In fact, the new figure just edges the Dallas Cowboys $1.23bn from the 2024 NFL season for the highest revenue total for a sports team ever measured by  Forbes  (without adjusting for inflation). So even with Real Madrid sitting out Saturday’s Champions League final—where Arsenal and Paris Saint-Germain will battle for an extra $29 million in prize money—Los Blancos are the worl...

West Ham United’s relegation from football’s Premier League has reopened the debate about the legacy of London 2012, as ministers begin to look at whether the UK could host another Olympic Games in the 2040s. The east London club is set to pay less in rent for the stadium that was converted into a football venue after the 2012 Olympics when it starts in the English Championship next season, meaning less income for the public owners of the arena. The episode is the latest pitfall to face the London Stadium, which shone during the Olympics but has struggled to satisfy the public since. Athletes have complained that the stadium now hosts too little athletics, while football fans have criticised the distance between their seats and the pitch. The Hammers last week battled to avoid dropping into the second tier but North London side Tottenham Hotspur stayed up instead. Their tussle came 14 years after the two clubs vied to lease the Olympic Stadium, which hosted the 2012 Olympic and Par...

Arsenal supporters used to want “Kroenke out”. Those calls have died down now that the Gunners have won their first Premier League title in 22 years. Beating Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League final later today would be a crowning moment for billionaire sports tycoon Stan Kroenke and son Josh. A lot has changed at Arsenal since the club lost to FC Barcelona in the 2006 Champions League final. That season, PSG finished ninth in the French league. These days, they’re a powerhouse. Now owned by state-backed Qatar Sports Investments, the defending champions of Europe have transformed into a winning machine and will be anything but a pushover for Arsenal.    Transformation is the word in Paris and north London. In 2005-06, Arsenal made a net profit of £7.9mn on revenues of £137mn. Its shares were still publicly traded. The club said goodbye to Highbury before moving to the 60,000-capacity Emirates Stadium. Arsène Wenger was still the manager. The women’s team was sti...