The Political Economy of Football V2

Another summer gone, another record broken. The rest of Europe will once more have gazed with envious eyes (or scarcely contained fury) as Premier League clubs indulged in another year of lavish spending. It had seemed at one point that last year’s figure of £3.1billion gross spending during the summer transfer window, which obliterated the previous record of £2.4billion, would not be reached. But as the end of the transfer window neared, clubs embarked on a spree that to some looked more akin to panic buying, perhaps for fear of being left behind by their rivals. Even before Manchester City had set a joint British transfer record by signing Enzo Fernández from Chelsea for £125million, the summer 2025 figure had been passed but once that move was confirmed, a new £3.3billion mark of gross spending had been set. There are some significant differences compared with last summer, however. Chelsea are once again among the biggest spenders with £349million splashed out, but they are ac...

The Swiss Ramble provides a forensic analysis of Championship finances.  The figures relate to 2024/5 and accounts for four clubs are not available.   One club (Wycombe Wanderers) published abbreviated accounts.   Sheffield Wednesday was in administration. It should be noted that overall Championship figures are very susceptible to the mix of clubs in any one season, i.e., ‘big’ versus ‘small’ clubs.      Spending by one club can have a distorting impact on some metrics, e.g., Sunderland spending on transfers. The underlying finances remain as crazy as ever as clubs compete to reach the promised land of the Premier League.   In effect what we have is a Premier League Division 2. Anyway, here are some highlights from the Swiss Ramble.   Much more is available on his Substack page. The 23 clubs (i.e. excluding Sheffield Wednesday) generated £907m of revenue and £22m other operating income, but then paid out £1.6 bn in operating exp...

The message was clear, loud and passionate from Everton fans at Bournemouth.   “Don’t sell Armstrong! Don’t sell Armstrong! I just don’t think you understand,” the away end sang at Bournemouth. “If you sell Armstrong, Harrison Armstrong, you’re gonna have a riot on your hands.” The news that prompted this outpouring was that 19-year-old midfielder Armstrong, the finest player produced by Everton’s youth academy in years, was likely to move to Nottingham Forest. Wary of breaching squad cost ratio rules (SCR), the club’s leadership were reluctantly willing to sanction the England youth international’s exit for some £40million. Had the Bournemouth game not taken place, giving Everton supporters the platform to vent their frustrations, Armstrong would likely be posing for photos holding a Garibaldi-red Forest shirt now. Instead, he will remain in the royal blue of Everton. For all of the owners’ billions, the episode shows that fan power remains in the Premier League — ...

Work on redeveloping Elland Road should give Leeds United a stadium more befitting of a vibrant regional capital and its team.  Construction projects are very reliant on materials and specialists turning up on time, and often they don’t, but the Leeds work has a special plus (see below). My stepdaughter undertook design work on the new Tottenham Hotspur stadium and upgrading a stadium in situ is no easy task.   She more usually works on venues such as airports and they present challenges, but of a different kind.   There are not that many people who specialise in football stadiums. On May 17th, hours after full time in the final home game of last season, the builders moved in at Elland Road. The redevelopment of the John Charles Stand, which will take its capacity from around 8,000 to more than 17,500 seats, was underway, and the clock has been ticking.    The overall capacity will be 53,000 when the work is finished. The Bremner Suite has been b...

Gemcorp, the London-based emerging markets asset manager, has been through many iterations and not a little controversy over the years. Is the next step the sunlit uplands of English League Two football? The firm headed by Bulgaria-born financier Atanas Bostandjiev appears to be backing an offer by a Brazilian investment group to invest in lossmaking Northampton Town Football Club, according to company filings. Gemcorp, Northampton Town, and the Brazilian investor did not respond to requests for comment from the Financial Times.  But they seem to be linked by public filings that point to a deal beyond the usual emerging markets fodder. We’ll lay it out here. Firstly, the Cobblers   have not had a good year. Relegated to League Two after a loss to Luton Town left them bottom of League One, they epitomise the financial challenges for teams trying to turn their fortunes around at these lower tiers of the English game. For the year to the end of June 2025, the club reported...

Recently I have suggested sports lawyer as a good career for an ambitious youngster, but there are other off the pitch options.  Professional football clubs’ share of UK hiring has tripled over the past five years, with a jump in demand for data experts as Britain’s top teams use their growing financial strength to expand their off-field operations. The clubs have emerged as a bright spot in an otherwise sluggish British jobs market, now accounting for more than seven in every 10,000 roles advertised, up from 2.4 per 10,000 in 2020, according to data from recruitment website Indeed. Data and analytics make up five per cent of the roles advertised by Premier League teams this year, according to job analytics firm Lightcast. This is double the share two years ago. The hiring boom has been fuelled by the deep pockets of Premier League clubs, which have seen revenues soar off the back of strong performances in European competitions and lucrative new commercial deals. “Data and anal...