The stretched finances of Championship clubs

The authoritative Swiss Ramble has taken a look at the finances of the Championship. Of course, the figures are a year out of date, but they still tell us something.

In contrast to the Premier League, only six clubs in the Championship made money, led by Nottingham Forest £32m and Barnsley £13m. Why Barnsley made a profit is unclear, as they only publish abbreviated accounts, but it is most likely to do with player sales.

In this very competitive division most clubs over-extend in a bid to reach the lucrative top flight. Largest losses were at two promoted clubs: Newcastle United £47m and Brighton £39m.

Profit on player sales is on low side in the Championship: below £20m for all but two clubs (and 15 of those were less than £10m). The two clubs to show a significant profit were Aston Villa and Newcastle United.

Newcastle United's £86m revenue was the highest in the Championship in 2016/17 (a record for the division), ahead of the other two relegated clubs (Norwich City £75m and Aston Villa £74m), then a sizeable gap to QPR £48m and Reading £37m. Top club not benefiting from parachute payments was Leeds United £34m. Championship revenues are greatly influenced by parachute payments. Even if parachute payments were excluded, the clubs with the highest revenue would still have been the three relegated from the Premier League.

Most Championship clubs receive £7-8m TV money, including £2.3m EFL central distribution and £4.3m Premier League solidarity payment (up from £2.3m in 15/16, thanks to the new three-year deal). Differences mainly due to how many times club is shown live (£100k home game, £10k away).

Newcastle's match day revenue of £23m was more than twice as much as the next highest in the Championship (Aston Villa £11m, Brighton £11m and Leeds United £10m) and was in fact above all but seven Premier League clubs. Half the clubs earned less than £5m from this revenue stream.

Newcastle's attendance of around 51,000 was by far the highest in the Championship, nearly 20,000 more than the closest challenger Aston Villa 32,000, who were followed by Derby County 29,000, Brighton 28,000 and Leeds 28,000.

Only six Championship clubs generated more than £10m commercial income with Leeds United leading the way at £16m, just ahead of Norwich City and Newcastle United (both £15m),

Newcastle United's £80m wage bill was miles above other Championship clubs, even after deducting £10m promotion bonus and £22m onerous contracts provision from the £112m reported by the club. Next highest were Aston Villa £61m, Norwich City £55m and Fulham £37m (also clubs benefiting from parachute payments). Over half of the Championship clubs pay more in wages than they earn.

It's no deal say Spurs insiders over Taiwanese takeover

Senior figures at Tottenham Hotspur insisted on Friday that they had not been informed of any deal to sell Daniel Levy’s stake in the club. A business group, Eight Sports Capital — which is said to include a billionaire Taiwanese financier — claimed that it had an agreement in place to buy a 24.99 per cent stake in ENIC, the club’s majority owners, from Levy, who owns 29.88 per cent. The Times has been told Ng Wing Fai and Brooklyn Earick form part of the group, having both been linked previously to potential takeovers of the Premier League club. The Taiwanese businessman, Richard Tsai, is also said to be part of the consortium. He is reportedly worth £7 billion. Last year Earick, the former DJ and tech entrepreneur, was part of an attempted £4.5 billion takeover, which was “unequivocally rejected” by Spurs. An ENIC spokesperson said: “We can confirm that neither ENIC nor THFC are aware of any sale by Daniel Levy’s Family Trust of its minority stake in ENIC, THFC’...

Reports about Charlton sale exaggerated

Reports have appeared in The Guardian and elsewhere that Charlton has been put up for sale. Richard Cawley is an authoritative local journalist who runs a South London Sport substack site. He reached out to the club yesterday evening to ask for comment on The Guardian’s article. Early indications from the club have been that nothing has changed since the story about them seeking investment, except that it is now a different company doing it. Charlton have since managed to consolidate their place in the Championship, avoiding an instant return to League One, with their women’s side promoted to the WSL, returning to the top flight for the first time since 2007, although staying there is likely to be costly. It would be counter-intuitive for owners Global Football Partners not to progress the club when looking for investment, that the focus remains on driving it forward, that their spend this summer is in line with long-term planning and will see an increase in wages spent on players...

Hull City's 'strange' loan

When football finance guru Kieran Maguire seems flashing lights in a club's loan deal, I become concerned. He is the leading football finance expert in the UK. Hull City have borrowed £55m against their stadium and training ground yet they should get £30m from the Premier League before long. What is going on? https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/cpwel48y51do

The Political Economy of Football V2

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