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Does Spurs collapse reflect greater top flight volatility?

It is the prospect of Spurs, one of English football’s so-called Big Six clubs, exiting the league that is capturing media attention as the Premier League season approaches its end. “There’s not much hope. There is anger, just disbelief really that we’re in this situation,” Flav Bateman, host of The Fighting Cock, a Spurs fan podcast told the Financial Times. “I think a lot of Spurs fans feel the same. We’re not even talking about it anymore.”

The club’s place in the Big Six has not chimed with performances on the pitch. Spurs have not won the league since 1961, while their last FA Cup trophy was 35 years ago.  

Fans complain that the emphasis on the business side has led to years of under-investment in players. Spurs have spent about £1.3bn on transfer fees for players in the past decade, the sixth highest in English football and similar to Liverpool and Arsenal, according to estimates from Transfermarkt.

However, Spurs spent just 43 per cent of revenue on player wages in the 2023-24 season, the joint lowest amount with newly promoted Luton Town, according to Deloitte. In that same period, Arsenal spent 53 per cent of revenue on wages, while Liverpool’s figure was 63 per cent. Historically, wage spending has correlated strongly with sporting performance.

Other big clubs have been relegated over the years, including Newcastle, Leeds and West Ham. Yet Spurs dropping out of the Premier League would be “unprecedented”, Omar Chaudhuri at sports data consultancy Twenty First Group told the FT, and could even cool investor interest in buying teams in England’s top division. 

“We’re not being stoical about this. It’ll be terrible if we go down,” said Bateman, adding that his big fear was the club simply “being forgotten about”. Among the 10 wealthiest clubs in European football, the only comparable relegation in recent years would be that of Italian club Juventus, who were forced to drop down a division in 2006 by the authorities following a corruption scandal rather than through sporting under performance. 

Although Spurs’ predicament is an extreme case, Chaudhuri told the Pink ‘Un  it was a further sign of increasing volatility in the Premier League. While previous league table positions have often been a good indicator of the following season’s performance, that relationship has been eroding, he said, as smaller clubs punch above their weight and a handful of big clubs slump.

Alongside Spurs, Manchester United and Chelsea have both recorded their lowest league finishes in decades in the past three years. 

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