The Political Economy of Football V2

The Sunday Times magazine carried a long article yesterday on Arsenal including a rare interview with manager Arteta and other key figures at the club.  It was clearly a public relations exercise designed to put the club in the best possible light ahead of the new season, fair enough.   However, it did contain some interesting statistics and comments for the neutral (I should mention that my stepdaughter and her husband are Gooners). 'Following last season's triumphs, analysts expect a 15 per cent bump [in revenue] for Arsenal, pushing the club beyond £790m.  That would place them firmly in the global financial elite ...it would make Arsenal third in the world behind the mighty Real Madrid and Barcelona.'  [The actual placing would depend on how much PSG grew their revenue]. The article points out that there are now four Basque managers in the Premier League: Arteta, Emery at Aston Villa, Iraola at Liverpool and Alonso at Chelsea.  The Basque population is ...

Bruno Guimaraes’ £75million move from Newcastle United to Arsenal gives more supporting evidence to several recent themes. At 28 years old, the sizeable outlay on the Brazilian midfielder continues Arsenal’s ploy of spending big money on players who can immediately improve their first team. A year ago, their roughly £185million in fees on players aged over 24 was the most ever spent on that cohort by an English club in a single season. A first Premier League title in 22 years comprised proof of concept. In the 12 years to the end of June 2025, Newcastle generated £352million from player sales. A reasonable estimate, even after sell-on clauses and solidarity payments to former clubs, has them matching that figure inside the past 12 months. Such statistics say lots about where Arsenal and Newcastle are as clubs, but the Guimaraes deal also underscores what is fast becoming a Premier League motif: the richest teams are ever more frequently plucking the best players from the rest of ...

Highlights from the Swiss Ramble's Premier League financial forecasts for the coming season: Arsenal are likely to set a new revenue record for English clubs after winning the Premier League and reaching the final of the Champions League. Revenue is boosted across the board by an uplift in central Premier League TV rights, mainly from overseas deals. Higher TV money from UEFA competitions, as nine clubs were involved in UEFA competitions, compared to seven in the previous season. Seven clubs froze ticket prices, but 13 increased their match day income via price increases. Only one club managed to generate an operating profit. However, there was a big increase in profit from player sales, partly driven by the assumption that deals completed in June 2026 are booked in the 2025/26 accounts. Three clubs have wages to turnover ratios above 80%, though, on the other hand, seven clubs are below 60%. Six clubs are profitable at a pre-tax level, though all but one of these are driven by sig...

Arsenal supporters used to want “Kroenke out”. Those calls have died down now that the Gunners have won their first Premier League title in 22 years. Beating Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League final later today would be a crowning moment for billionaire sports tycoon Stan Kroenke and son Josh. A lot has changed at Arsenal since the club lost to FC Barcelona in the 2006 Champions League final. That season, PSG finished ninth in the French league. These days, they’re a powerhouse. Now owned by state-backed Qatar Sports Investments, the defending champions of Europe have transformed into a winning machine and will be anything but a pushover for Arsenal.    Transformation is the word in Paris and north London. In 2005-06, Arsenal made a net profit of £7.9mn on revenues of £137mn. Its shares were still publicly traded. The club said goodbye to Highbury before moving to the 60,000-capacity Emirates Stadium. Arsène Wenger was still the manager. The women’s team was sti...

The Kroenke family first invested in Arsenal in 2007, eventually taking full control in 2018. After years of perceived lack of communication and ambition, supporters launched the “We Care, Do You?” campaign in 2019, which questioned their ownership.  Two years later effigies of 'Silent' Stan were hanged and burnt outside the Emirates Stadium by fans protesting Arsenal’s decision to become founding members of the ill-fated European Super League.  The Arsenal supporters who felt the Kroenkes were detached and uncommunicative launched their “We Care” petition, gaining more than 100,000 signatures. The Kroenkes felt there were misconceptions about the work they had been doing in the background. Josh Kroenke said in a press conference: “Should we get a great result on Saturday, it’s not going to change or affect who we are. When you win something, the sun’s still going to come up the next day. You’ve got to get back to work and there are many teams trying to gain on you, incl...

Chelsea’s underachievement this season has been highlighted by a financial analysis that says only Wolverhampton Wanderers have performed worse in the Premier League compared to money splashed out by the top flight’s biggest spenders.  One Chelsea fan described it as ‘epic mismanagement.’ Despite spending £637 million on wages, transfers and agents fees, Chelsea finished tenth — 33 points behind champions Arsenal — and missed out on the European places. Sunderland’s achievement in qualifying for the Europa League spot secured them billing as the best value for money along with Arsenal, followed by Brentford, Bournemouth and Brighton & Hove Albion. After Wolves and Chelsea, Burnley were the next worst-performing, followed by Tottenham Hotspur. Omar Chaudhuri, the chief intelligence officer at the sports intelligence agency Twenty First Group, which carried out the analysis for The Times, said: “Chelsea are in the top two spenders but have failed to qualify for th...

It would seem that Arsenal are not particularly popular champions this season because of their style of play.  To me it seems that if set plays win you matches, that's fair enough.  In any event the Gooners are laughing all the way to the bank. Arsenal’s first Premier League title for over two decades is expected to generate almost £200million ($269m) in domestic prize money as payouts to England’s top clubs hit new heights this season.   That is before we talk about the Champions League. Arsenal are expected to earn £198.7 million in broadcast revenues from the Premier League this season, a £27.2m increase on 2024-25 and £23.8m more than Liverpool received for winning the competition a year ago.  Arsenal’s takings are expected to be over £20 million higher than the previous single-season record: Manchester City’s £176.2m in 2022-23. The New York Times estimates that five clubs — Arsenal, City, Manchester United, Aston Villa and Liverpool — have all cleared ...

Arsenal fans are facing a 10-fold increase in flight and hotel costs to travel to Budapest for the club’s first Champions League final in 20 years. The Gunners, who beat Atlético Madrid earlier this week, will now take on defending champions Paris Saint-Germain on May 30 in a match to crown the best team in Europe. Declan Rice, who captained the team during the winning match, called for 200,000 fans to support the team in the Hungarian capital, a number that far exceeds the 61,400 capacity set for the game at the Puskás Aréna, which will host Uefa’s flagship event. Airline prices to fly the day before the game from London to Budapest on Wizz Air have reached as high as £650, more than 10 times the fare normally offered by the Hungarian budget carrier. Wizz Air has promised to double capacity ahead of the event, operating eight flights from Luton and Gatwick on May 29 and another six on May 30.  Outbound Wizz Air flights shot up to £646.99 earlier this week, according to prici...

Arsenal’s pre-tax loss significantly reduced for the second year in a row, falling from £18m to just £1m, so they effectively broke-even.    The Zurich-based football finance guru Swiss Ramble has provided his usual forensic analysis.  For much more depth, go to his Substack pag.   Here are some highlights. The improvement was driven by good growth in (football) revenue, which shot up £76m (13%) from £614m to a new club record £690m, while profit from player sales also greatly increased by £30m from £51m to £81m. Arsenal’s revenue growth in the last three years has been very impressive, as income has surged by a massive £321m (87%) from £369m to £690m, easily a new club record. Arsenal’s £690m revenue is now the third highest in England, having overtaken Manchester United £667m, Tottenham £565m and Chelsea £491m. They have basically caught up with Manchester City £694m, while they are not far behind Liverpool £703m. However, this was partially offset ...

Arsenal Supporters' Trust state: ' We are disappointed that the FSA’s  ‘ Protect the Fans, Protect the Game’   proposals calling for a ticket price freeze across all Premier League clubs has not been taken up. Neither the Premier League nor Arsenal have seriously engaged with the idea that a freeze at all clubs would help stop the ‘arms race’. Season tickets will be going up by 3.9 per cent (slightly above the rate of inflation) and most season tickets will cost over £1,000.   A seat in the centre of the lower tier will go up by 27 per cent to £1,281. AST continued: 'We firmly believe that with the football sector benefitting from ever-increasing broadcast and commercial revenues it is time to stop squeezing match-going supporters so hard. Arsenal recently reported to Deloitte a big increase in last season’s total revenue to £691m (up by 10%) and ticketing income of £154m (up by 19%). It is frustrating for fans to see football clubs and leagues do so little to combat...

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer presented his  Chinese counterpart President Xi Jinping with a Premier League match ball flown 5,000 miles from London. Tthe UK Prime Minister arrived in Beijing armed with one of the yellow Puma match balls used in Sunday’s Premier League fixture between Arsenal and Manchester United, a game he had attended at the Emirates Stadium.    It wassigned by a number of United pl;ayers. It was reportedly presented to Xi ahead of a formal summit and lunch in the Great Hall of the People, with China’s president widely known to be a Manchester United supporter.  Xi’s affection for Manchester United may have been reasonably well known, but more surprising was the revelation   that he told Starmer he also has a fondness for Arsenal, Manchester City and Crystal Palace. Xi’s last trip to Manchester saw him given a tour of the Etihad Campus by City’s chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak, who has subsequently become a special envoy to China on...

Manchester United's defeat of Arsenal at the Emirates yesterday was something of a surprise (and a great game of football for the neutral).  However, it should not be assumed that United's problems are over after two wins or that Arsenal have now lost the title as some of their nervous fans fear.  {Dido is an Arsenal fan). Arsenal went into the game sitting at the top of both the Premier League and the Uefa Champions League tables, a rise underpinned by significant spending on players and years of settled ownership under US billionaire Stan Kroenke.  Manchester United have outspent Arsenal over the past five years, yet stability has eluded them: less than two years after taking control of club operations Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s Ineos has already sacked two managers. Both clubs have had to handle a bumpy period of transition following the departures of long-serving managers — Arsène Wenger at Arsenal and Manchester United’s Sir Alex Ferguson. But while United’s owners have la...

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...

From next season, Visit Rwanda will not appear on the sleeve of Arsenal’s shirts.  The club announced that they will end their eight-year partnership with the Rwanda Development Board in June 2026. Many Arsenal fans will be relieved to see the association with Visit Rwanda conclude, with the relationship coming under considerable scrutiny due to the Rwandan government being accused of serial abuses by multiple human rights groups. Rwanda’s backing of M23 militia in neighbouring Congo has amplified those concerns. A recent survey among the Arsenal Supporters’ Trust showed that more than 90 per cent of respondents wanted the partnership to end, with 67 per cent voting to negotiate an immediate exit from the deal. A further 23 per cent were prepared to wait until the contract’s expiry next summer. An early termination was never particularly likely for Arsenal — extricating themselves from the Visit Rwanda agreement would have been incredibly complex, as well as po...

Spurs’ state-of-the-art stadium is the envy of the Premier League and has been widely considered one of the best venues in Europe since it opened in April 2019 — after a three-year build — at a cost of £1.2billion ($1.6bn). The Emirates, now nearly 20 years old, remains a spectacular ground in its own right, and one of the best in England, but it has aged quickly over the past six years due to the competition it faces from the blue-and-white part of north London. Whether it is hosting the biggest music artists, annual NFL matches, boxing events or housing the F1 Drive — an electric go-karting track — under the South Stand, Spurs’ stadium is light years ahead of Arsenal’s home. As part of their agreement with Islington Council, Arsenal can host six non-football events attended by more than 10,000 people per calendar year. Only three of these are allowed to be music concerts. Spurs, on the other hand, can host up to 30 non-football events. That is an increase on the 16 Haringey C...

  The authoritative Swiss Ramble looks at the gap between the ‘Big Six’ and other top flight clubs. They invariably have the financial muscle to ensure that results such as Unitrd and Spurs last season are the exception, rather than the rule, while other less fortunate clubs cannot afford a bad season or two, as shown by Leicester City’s decline since surprisingly winning the league. If we define success as qualifying for Europe, an achievement that has the added benefit of enhancing revenue streams, there is no debate around the success of the Big Six. In the last 15 years, there have been only two occasions when less than five members of the Big Six failed to qualify for European competitions. Indeed, in more than half of those seasons, all six clubs successfully negotiated this hurdle. Moreover, they almost always qualified for the lucrative Champions League. Out of the 63 slots available since 2010/11, all but four of them have gone to the Big Six, the only exceptions b...

The authoritative Swiss Ramble looks at how Arsenal have been able to splash the cash this summer, Much more information and detail on his Substack page. The Gunners splashed out a hefty £282m net, which was just ahead of Liverpool’s £268m. Both clubs spent a lot more than every other club, with the next highest being around £100m lower, namely Manchester United £183m and Tottenham Hotspur £178m.   To further underline the size of the outlay, this was not only the highest net spend in England, but also worldwide this summer. Unlike the other big spenders, Arsenal only recouped £9m from player sales, the largest fees being for the deals taking Nuno Tavares to Lazio for £4m, Marquinhos to Cruzeiro for £3m and Albert Sambi Lokonga to Hamburg for £300k. In fact, only newly promoted Leeds United made less from player sales than Arsenal’s £9m this summer.   In stark contrast, Chelsea generated a massive £288m from player sales. One reason that Arsenal were able to spend so m...

While at the time of its inauguration, the Emirates was considered at the vanguard of the stadium experience, it has fallen behind in the intervening years as technology has transformed our daily lives. General modernisation would be welcomed. For example, phone connectivity is awful and the improvement that has been discussed for a while is yet to materialise. The PA system is imperfect in parts of the stadium. More recent rebuilds utilise innovative systems to get fans through food and drink concessions quicker. All these factors go hand in hand with any capacity increase. The building itself is only one part of the infrastructure which needs attention, though. Working with the local council, emergency services and Transport for London, plans for an extra 10,000 (possibly more) people to safely arrive and leave the area are a considerable obstacle. As things stand, two of the stations which are closest to the Emirates and in normal use outside of matchdays are forced out of actio...

Tim Lewis will leave his position as the executive vice-chairman of Arsenal in what is a significant change at boardroom level for the club. Lewis was a supporter of Financial Fair Play in the Premier League and someone who advocated the blocking of takeovers linked to nation states. The 62-year-old corporate lawyer has advised Arsenal’s ownership group, Kroenke Sports & Entertainment (KSE) since 2007, then became a director at Arsenal in 2020 and was promoted three years later. Lewis forged a close relationship with the manager, Mikel Arteta, at the Emirates Stadium and was key to the new contract the Spaniard signed in 2023. He helped to lead Arsenal through the Covid-19 pandemic and had become a significant figure at Premier League level. The timing of Lewis’s departure is seen as a surprise given his involvement in their summer recruitment, along with Andrea Berta, the sporting director, and Arteta. He was key to the signing of Eberechi Eze from Crystal Pa...

The nine English clubs involved in European competition — Arsenal, Aston Villa, Chelsea, Crystal Palace, Liverpool, Manchester City, Newcastle United, Nottingham Forest and Tottenham Hotspur — must each abide by a different set of financial strictures to their remaining 11 domestic peers this season. Some fans see these rules as a mechanism to protect existing top clubs from challengers.   Financial penalties can be treated as a cost of business by wealthy clubs.   Only points deductions or exclusion from a competition would really hit them. UEFA’s football earnings rule limits clubs to €60million (£51.9m at today’s rate) in losses over a three-year period, albeit that limit can be upped by €10m per year (to a maximum total of €90m across a given assessment period) if clubs meet each of four conditions UEFA deem representative of good financial health. They are: positive equity; a quick ratio — current assets, less stock, divided by current liabilities — of one or above; a...