The Political Economy of Football V2

 In 2024/25, Real Madrid remained the only football club to generate over €1 billion in revenue, doing so for the second consecutive year. While the club reported a 6% decrease in matchday revenue, primarily driven by a reduction in revenue from the sale of Personal Seat Licenses, its €233m matchday revenue would still rank as the second highest ever generated by a Money League club. Additionally, the club reported a 23% increase in commercial revenue, driven by improved merchandise performance and new commercial partners. For the first time since 2019/20, FC Barcelona returned to the Deloitte Money League podium (2 nd ), generating €975m. Despite continuing to play matches away from the Spotify Camp Nou, which is due for completion during the 2025/26 season, the club reported a 27% growth in revenue compared to 2023/24. A key driver for this growth was the introduction of Personal Seat Licence arrangements, generating one-off c.€70m. Much like Real Madrid during the 2023/24 se...

The Deloitte Money League for 2026 has been published.  The cumulative revenue of the Money League clubs grew by 11%, rising to €12.4 billion (2023/24: €11.2 billion). Matchday (€2.4 billion), broadcast (€4.7 billion) and commercial (€5.3 billion) revenues all grew to record levels, as the latter became the first revenue stream to exceed €5 billion. For the third consecutive year, commercial revenue represented the most significant proportion of total revenue for Money League clubs, generating an average of €265m (2025: €244m). The key drivers for this included improved retail performance, increasing sponsorship revenue, as well as the use of stadia and surrounds on non-matchdays. The latter represents a significant shift in the business models of certain clubs to focus on greater utilisation of stadia assets through a diversified entertainment offering. On-site breweries, restaurants, hotels, and other offerings are therefore becoming more common, demonstrating the importance ...

A look at the finances of Football League founders and Championship perennials Preston North End.  Extracts come from the latest report on the club from the authoritative Swiss Ramble. Preston’s pre-tax loss worsened from £14.3m to £17.7m in 2024/25, despite revenue rising £3.6m (21%) from £16.9m to £20.5m, a new club high.   This was more than offset by a steep increase in operating expenses, up £6.7m (21%) from £31.6m to £38.3m. In addition, they made nothing from player sales, though the previous season was not so hot either, only contributing £0.4m.   The result after tax was better, thanks to a £4.3m tax credit, though this still widened from £9.9m to £13.4m. There was growth across the board, as all three revenue streams set new club records. The largest increase was in broadcasting, which rose £2.3m (25%) from £9.5m to £11.8m, but match day was up £1.1m (25%) from £4.3m to £5.4m. In addition, commercial was slightly higher, rising £0.2m (7%) From £3.1m to £3.3m...

Accountancy firm BDO reports that global interest in domestic game continues to grow with record-breaking revenues of £6.4bn in the Premier League in 2024, rising club valuations and a surge in interest in women’s football.   Clubs face persistent high costs, with wages representing 63% of revenues in the Premier League and 93% in the Championship, and over 90% expect to incur pre-tax losses in 2025, with the nearly the same proportion stating that they will require shareholder funding in the near future Player transfers hit record highs in 2025, but separate analysis from Twenty First Group highlights that the correlation between spend and on-field results is surprisingly low (just 57%, and a mere 35% when you exclude ‘superclubs’) Despite financial challenges, investor interest in clubs remains high with two-thirds of clubs saying they have received an approach from prospective investors in the last 12 months     There is widening financial disparity both ...

Henry Mance of the FT provides a balanced assessment of the debate about VAR.  For me, it confirms that most fans are conservative technophobes at heart.  Back in the 1950s many of them opposed the introduction of floodlights. It does need tweaking and Mance has some useful suggestions. Moreover, if the VAR team can't reach a decision in three minutes, the on field decision should stand.   But so much is at stake financially in modern football that mistakes by officials can't simply be shrugged off. Here’s some good news about the world in 2026: football refereeing is more accurate than ever. If you don’t believe me, look at the English Premier League’s list of recent wrong decisions. Most of the mistakes are marginal. Thanks to technology, glaring errors are now even rarer than successful Manchester United signings. It is basically impossible that England will be knocked out of this year’s World Cup by an equivalent of Diego Maradona’s 1986 Hand of God (they will ...

Throughout all their ups and downs, Plymouth Argyle have strived to be financially sustainable, so let’s take a look via the Swiss Ramble at the latest accounts to see how they have performed against this objective. Despite relegation, Argyle actually managed to generate a pre-tax profit of £0.3m in 2024/25, following a £2.4m loss the previous season. The club said this was “the result of success in player trading, which overcame significant costs of competing in the Championship”. The main driver of Argyle’s revenue growth was broadcasting, thanks to the new EFL TV rights deal, which led to an increase of £2.3m (22%) from £10.6m to £12.9m. However, there was also good growth elsewhere, as match day rose £0.4m (9%) from £5.5m to £5.9m, while commercial was up £0.4m (5%) from £9.6m to £10.0m. Argyle’s return to profitability was good news, but they have still posted losses six times in the last eight years.   That said, Argyle’s losses have been very small compared to the vast...

Eight months to the day from delivering the greatest moment in Crystal Palace’s history by winning the FA Cup there seems to be no way back for Oliver Glasner. An abrupt early ending feels like an inevitability. Joy has turned to despair. Frustration has grown. Anger has simmered. Tensions have risen. Another emotional outburst from the Palace manager, to follow an astonishing press conference just over 24 hours earlier, has surely created an intolerable situation after scathing criticism of the club’s hierarchy. Some fans, too, seem to have turned on him, even if there is at least some acknowledgement that his anger comes from being dealt a terrible hand.    Against that, it should be noted that there was a heartfelt article in The Times yesterday by a Palace fan saying that they had lost the best manager they ever had. As full-time came at the Stadium of Light and Palace had suffered a 2-1 defeat to make it 10 games without a win, Glasner walked over to acknowledge the...

 Afer a troubled history, Valencia are at last making progress on their much needed stadium:  https://footballgroundguide.com/news/nou-mestalla-redevelopment-restart-marks-biggest-project-in-valencia-history-ahead-of-2027-opening.html

It's not often that the editorial in the Financial Times is about football, but their editorial today is well worth reproducing. For all that they say, for fans the manager remains of central and possibly exaggerated importance,   Look at the jeopardy facing Thomas Frank after today's home defeat to West Ham and the boos of fans.  Or consider the article in today's Times in which a Crystal Palace fan effectively blames the board for losing their 'best ever' manager. The Pink 'Un states: 'Since New Year, three of the world’s most famous football clubs — Chelsea, Manchester United and Real Madrid — have sacked their head coach. This is normal for the industry: the average tenure of head coaches across Europe is now about 1.2 years, with most serving less than a season. The sackings illustrate football’s dysfunctionality. They also highlight the passing of football’s “big man” era. If clubs, fans and coaches themselves can adjust to this shift, that may be no b...

Crystal Palace manager Oliver Glasner has confirmed he will leave the club this summer at the end of his contract.  The Austrian’s announcement comes as Manchester City are in the process of finalising an agreement with Palace to sign centre-back Marc Guehi in a package worth £20million ($26.8m) plus bonuses and a sell-on clause. Palace are without a win in nine matches across all competitions, and exited the FA Cup third round to Macclesfield of the National League North on Saturday, but Glasner insisted the timing of his future announcement is coincidental. Palace are currently 13th in the Premier League after 21 rounds of action, and are in the play-off stages of the Conference League, where they play Bosnian side Zrinjski, ahead of the knockout stage. They were unfairly deprived of what should have been a Europa League place by Uefa technicalities. It had seemed clear for some time that the direction of travel was for Glasner to depart at the end of his contract and ...

The Italian lakes are a favourite destination for English tourists and many wealthy Milan residents have second homes there.   One of my abiding memories is being hosted by the Rockefeller Foundation at their splendid centre in Bellagio. Normally the likes of Como FC would not attract the attention of the Swiss Ramble.   But his Zurich fastness is not far away and if he ever tears himself away from his spreadsheets, he might well spend a weekend there. Reading his analysis of Como FC they look a bit like Wrexham iin the EFL.    It also shows that emerging countries are likely to be an increasing source of funds for football. One of the big football stories in Italy has been the rise of Como as they returned to Serie A after a 21-year absence, finishing in a very creditable 10th place in their first season back in 2024/25. To date, this season has been even more promising, as they are currently in 6th place, very much involved in the race for European quali...

One time prime minister Harold Macmillan once said of The Wirral ‘funny place, it sticks out, up there.’   I have only been to Tranmere Rovers once, but I was able to park in the road outside and I thought they were a really friendly club. The problem is that they are the third club on Merseyside and it is relatively easy to travel across the Mersey.    The Wirral itself is an odd mixture of deprived and high end housing.    There was once another EFL club at New Brighton:   the once decaying seaside resort is seeing something ofa revival. Tranmere Rovers are set to become the latest English team to come under American ownership, as a bid for the Merseyside club from Ascent Capital Partners is waiting for English Football League (EFL) approval. Current owners former Football Association (FA) chief executive Mark Palios and his wife Nicola bought the club in 2014 but have been trying to sell the League Two side for at least two years. They decli...

A former executive chairman and co-owner of Major League Baseball team the San Diego Padres is set to take a controlling stake in League One club Lincoln City. American Ron Fowler initially bought a minority interest in third-tier Lincoln in April 2024, and he is now poised to replace Arizona-based Harvey Jabara as the majority shareholder if his bid is cleared by the English Football League. Lincoln's board approved a proposal from Fowler to increase his stake - through his company Liquid Investments - to more than 25% on 11 December. Fowler, whose son Andrew is also involved in the club, will take on the position of chairman at LNER Stadium and will "assume responsibility for the funding of the club for the immediate future". The ownership shake-up at Lincoln, who are second in the table, was confirmed as a "future development" in the club's annual accounts covering the 12 months up to June 2025. controlling stake in League One club Lincoln City. Fowler wi...

Alonso’s sacking shows that at Real Madrid, the opinion of only one man ultimately counts: the president. Perez has given up very quickly on new managers before — Rafael Benitez lasted six months during the 2015-16 campaign, and Julen Lopetegui got just 14 games before the axe fell in the autumn of 2018. Alonso has not improved his reputation during his short time as Madrid coach, failing to get the team playing the way he wants. His reserved personality and technocratic approach led to issues with both the dressing room and the boardroom. He may also have regrets about allowing himself to drift away from his own convictions over recent months. Ultimately, the past eight months have served as a reminder of just how unique Madrid is within world sport. Perhaps a ‘project’ manager like Alonso, who came in looking to impose his own ideas about the game, was always doomed to failure. Some around the Bernabeu say that Perez was never convinced about the idea of hiring him, which made ...

Yesterday’s FA Cup result at Old Trafford said something about the relative states of Brighton and Manchester United, one club on an upward trajectory,  the other sinking into a Slough of Despind.  Here are some extracts from the Swiss Ramble’s assessment of Brighton, much more in depth analysis on his Substack page. Tony Bloom outlined the club’s approach, “We want to be a sustainable football club. We will have seasons where we lose a lot of money, as well as some seasons where we make a lot of money. But over time, if we stay in the Premier League, we will be sustainable and we will be profitable.” However, the owner added, “Most of our rivals are not. So it’s really tough to compete with that.” Player sales model Brighton have now made a staggering £351m from player sales in the last four years, which is a dramatic change in approach, e.g. in the previous eight years their profits from this activity were only £29m In the three seasons up to 2023/24, only two clubs ...

While many of us downed tools over the holiday period, the sports stadium building boom continued without a pause and the new year has seen things ramp up.  On Thursday, US-owned Premier League team Leeds United secured planning permission to expand Elland Road to a capacity of 53,000. Earlier in the week, Nottingham Forest — owned by Greek billionaire Evangelos Marinakis — unveiled plans to redevelop the City Ground, with a view to taking capacity there north of 50,000 one day too. Crystal Palace, which announced redevelopment plans for Selhurst Park eight years ago, may soon start putting spades in the ground.   Further down the English football pyramid, Millwall secured a new 999-year lease on its stadium, The Den, which will help clear the way for a potential expansion and upgrade there too. Work to build a new stand at Wrexham is now under way, while Birmingham City’s eye-catching designs are still fresh off the printing press. As the UK economy has sput...

 The New Year may typically be the season of goodwill, but two of football’s biggest clubs chose to swing the axe. Private equity-owned Chelsea sacked head coach Enzo Maresca, while Manchester United ditched Ruben Amorim. The two teams have since slipped from fifth and sixth in the league respectively to seventh and eighth. In the hotly contested race to reach the Champions League, those few places are pivotal for a club’s financial fortunes. Chelsea’s owners chose to hire from within their (small) multi-club operation, bringing in Liam Rosenior from the French club they own, RC Strasbourg. MCOs regularly trade players, but moving a manager within the group will be an experiment worth watching.     United are set to wait until the summer to appoint a permanent replacement for Amorim, with Crystal Palace coach Oliver Glasner among the favourites. The double sacking raises an important question — do head coaches actually make that much of a di...

When you think about it, fans of three leading London clubs are not happy with the way they are being run - West Ham, Tottenham Hotspur and Chelsea. A snap survey by Chelsea Supporters’ Trust has revealed that over 90 per cent of fans do not have confidence in “the ownership group’s football-related decision-making”, while more than 80 per cent are not confident that the club is being run in a way that will deliver “sustained success over the next three to five years”. The survey, which garnered nearly 4,000 responses in 48 hours, also found that more than 40 per cent of respondents felt the club’s current sporting structure is “not fit for purpose”, with a further 42.69 per cent believing it has “significant weaknesses”. The most damning response was surely in relation to satisfaction with the owners’ football decisions, with 53.7 per cent of respondents having “no confidence at all” and 36.9 per cent “not very much confidence”. Chelsea are owned by BlueCo, the Todd Boehly and C...

Brighton & Hove Albion suffered a £54.4million ($72.9m) loss before interest and tax in the 2024-25 season.  The transformation from big profits in previous years to a hefty deficit was anticipated, due to an unprecedented spend of nearly £210m on signings during Fabian Hurzeler’s first season as head coach, which ended in an eighth-place Premier League finish. Brighton made a £73.3m profit for the 2023-24 season, when they reached the last 16 of the Europa League under former head coach Roberto De Zerbi and finished 11th in the league. The profit included £115m from the then-British record sale of Moises Caicedo and £25m for goalkeeper Robert Sanchez, as their transfers to Chelsea in the summer of 2023 fell outside the accounting period for the 2022-23 campaign. Brighton made a Premier League record profit across all clubs of £122.8m in 2022-23. That was aided by player sales, merit money for finishing sixth to qualify for Europe for the first time and compensation for the...

The authoritative Swiss Ramble asks which clubs have benefitted most from European competition over the past decade.  Real Madrid have earned the most TV money from UEFA competitions in the last 10 years, being the only club to break through the billion Euros barrier with €1,021m. Four other clubs have received more than €800m in this period: Paris Saint-Germain €974m, Manchester City €935m, Bayern Munich €935m and Barcelona €836m. Half of the top six are from La Liga, as Atletico Madrid are in sixth place with €761m. The next highest English clubs are further back, namely Liverpool €725m, Chelsea €589m, Manchester United €537m, Arsenal €480m and Tottenham €429m. As might be expected, the so-called Big Six English clubs have received the lion’s share of UEFA TV money in the last 10 years, amounting to €3.7 bln or 90% of the English distribution.   Manchester City have been by far the most successful English club in Europe with their €935m being €110m more than the next hig...

Some highlights from the Swiss Ramble's authoritative analysis of Hull City's finances.  An exhaustive analysis can be found on his Substack page. Hull have lost money in all three of the seasons since Ilıcalı bought the club, adding up to £34.3m. In fact, they have now posted losses in four of the last five years.    This is in marked contrast to the preceding period, where the Allams’ tight-fisted/sustainable approach (delete as appropriate) led to the club posting profits six years out of seven. A key element of the club’s business model is to make money from player trading, so the £57m generated in the last three seasons has been very important. This marked a “return to form”, as their profit only amounted to £5m in the preceding 2-year period. Hull’s revenue has grown by an impressive £10.4m (68%) in the last three years, rising from £15.4m to £25.8m. This is easily the club’s highest revenue outside the Premier League in a season without parachute payments. It w...

European football clubs have been left on the sidelines of a deals boom that has highlighted soaring valuations for US sports franchises and underlined the challenges facing Europe’s team owners. Investors argue that a failure to get a grip on costs, as well as the constant threat of relegation, has kept a lid on European interest even as a flurry of deals in the US has underscored rising valuations in several sports. Valuations of the top men’s football teams, which are concentrated in Europe, have stagnated at just 4.2 times revenue. M&A activity in European football has dropped sharply since a spate of record-breaking takeovers in 2022, according to figures from governing body Uefa. Apollo Global Management agreed to buy a controlling stake in Atlético Madrid, Spain’s third-biggest football club, at a valuation of between €2bn and €2.5bn in 2025. The lower end of that range implies a valuation of 4.9 times its 2024 revenue. According to the most recent figures from Uefa, more t...