Did Blades play it too safe?

From his Zurich fastness, the authoritative Swiss Ramble casts his forensic eye over the 2019/20 accounts of Sheffield United.

Following promotion the Blades swung from £21m pre-tax loss to £19m profit, a £40m improvement, as revenue shot up £122m from £21m to club record £143m, though profit on player sales fell £10m to £4m and competing in the Premier League increased expenses by £72m. Profit after tax was £18m.

The main driver of the £122m revenue increase was broadcasting, up £109m from £8m to £117m, due to the much more lucrative Premier League TV deal, though commercial also rose £13m from £7m to £20m, while match day was up £0.8m (13%) from £5.9m to £6.7m.

Revenue of £143m is an incredible 13 times as much as the £11m they reported in League One just three years ago with £115m of the £132m increase coming from broadcasting, which contributes 82% of total revenue. There was slso significant growth in commercial, up from £3m to £20m.

£143m revenue was a very respectable 11th highest in the Premier League, ahead of clubs like Crystal Palace £141m and West Ham United £140m. That said, this was still £200m below Arsenal £343m, the lowest of the so-called “Big Six”.

£19m profit is the second best result reported to date in the 2019/20 Premier League, only surpassed by Chelsea £36m. The scale of the achievement is emphasised by no fewer than 8 clubs posting losses above £50m. The other promoted club Norwich City made a much smaller £3m profit.

The club managed to post a £16m operating profit (i.e. excluding player sales and interest) in the Premier League, which is actually the highest to date in 2019/20, significantly better than most other clubs, e.g. three had losses over £100m

Without COVID, revenue would have been £11.2m higher at £154m, due to £8.7m broadcasting rebate and £2.5m other lost income. Along with £0.5m additional costs incurred, this would have resulted in the club posting an even higher profit of £31m.

Blades only benefited from £4m profit from player sales, down from £14m the previous year. This is one of the lowest profits from this activity in the top flight. The profit from player sales has increased in the last three years, totaling £27m, including sell-on fees for Harry Maguire and Kyle Walker. This is twice as much as the previous 7 years combined. Very little profit in 2020/21 to date, though summer sales are to come.

If the Blades are relegated from the Premier League, TV income would fall significantly, albeit cushioned by £42m parachute payment, which would give them much higher revenue than most other Championship clubs. . Parachutes fall to £35m in year two and £16m in year three.

The wage bill nearly doubled from £41m to £78m. Prior season included hefty promotion bonuses, so wages were only £19m in 2017/18. This means that wages have grown £59m in the last two years, while revenue has increased £123m in the same period.

Despite the steep increase, the £78m wage bill is the lowest in the Premier League in 2019/20, around £11m less than the other promoted club Norwih City£89m.

The wages to turnover ratio improved from 195% in the Championship (including sizeable promotion bonuses) to only 54%, one of the lowest in the Premier League. It would have been just 50% if COVID impact excluded. Arguably, the club played it too safe.

The £66m outlay on player purchases last season was more than three times as much as the previous nine years combined (£21m). Club spent a further £44m last summer.

£17m gross debt was one of the smallest in the Premier League, much lower than some other clubs, though many of these have taken on debt for new stadiums or training grounds.

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’...

Spurs CEO attacks luxury training base

The Tottenham Hotspur chief executive Vinai Venkatesham has issued a withering assessment of the way the club was run under Daniel Levy, likening the state-of-the-art training centre to a five-star hotel rather than a centre of high performance. Venkatesham was appointed to his role in April 2025, having stepped down as chief executive at Arsenal the previous summer. However, he has said that some aspects of the club were “in a significantly worse state” than he expected. “Our training centre is amazing, one of the best, if not the best in the world,” Venkatesham told BBC Sport. “But when you look around, it looks more like a five-star hotel than it does a performance environment. That will change over the summer. I think there are many areas where the club hasn’t got the right level of expertise.” He explained that the football side of operations was the club’s main downfall when he arrived last year. [One Spurs fan wryly observed that it was like a water company sayi...

Fulham requires big funding from owner

After lengthy delays, Fulham’s shiny, new Riverside Stand has finally opened, creating “a unique Thameside destination with first class facilities for supporters and partners on match days, as well as for the wider community year-round”. This ambitious project has increased Craven Cottage’s capacity by around 4,000 to 29,600, while it has also taken advantage of the club’s fantastic location and wealthy catchment area by including two Michelin star restaurants, a rooftop swimming pool, corporate hospitality and event space, all benefiting from views of the Thames. Chief executive Alistair Mackintosh observed, “Fulham is the sort of club that can have a business class or first class and have fans that turn left on a plane.” Indeed, there is also an exclusive members club – with a football season ticket as an optional extra. It’s fair to say that “the times they are a-changing”, as this is a long way from the traditional pie and a pint. However, in a world where clubs face the tw...

The Political Economy of Football V2

Search This Blog