The Political Economy of Football V2

Globalisation may be under threat elsewhere, but it persists and indeed accelerates in football, La Liga want to stage December’s scheduled domestic league fixture between Villarreal and Barcelona in Miami. According to multiple sources familiar with the discussions, who asked The Athletic to remain anonymous to protect relationships, the Spanish top-flight league have held preliminary discussions to relocate the fixture, which would ordinarily take place at Villarreal’s Estadio de la Ceramica home in eastern Spain, to instead be staged in Florida. It would be the first time a European top-flight league fixture has taken place in the United States. On Monday, the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) will discuss their approval of the proposal, which if granted, would lead to UEFA being asked to initiate the procedures for FIFA to grant authorisation for the fixture change. The Spanish league first attempted to stage a match abroad in 2018 with a proposal for Girona’s home league ...

From his Zurich fastness, the authoritative Swiss Ramble notes: 'Last week's Champions League semi-final between Manchester City and Real Madrid was very exciting with only one goal separating them. This is not surprising from a financial perspective, as they are very close in terms of revenue, wages and squad cost.   Revenue is just £4m apart, although City’s squad cost is higher. ' 'In stark contrast Liverpool are much more powerful financially than Villarreal, as the Reds have 4-5 times as much revenue, wages and squad cost as their Spanish rivals.'

The inspiring Swiss Ramble has been working this weekend on the achievements of Villareal  which reveal a record of good financial management that other clubs could learn from.  Their European achievement To place their achievement in reaching Champions League semi-finals into perspective, their €124m revenue is far below €164m required to be in the top 30 of the Deloitte Money League. Bayern Munich, who they beat in the quarter-finals, have five times as much with €611m. Europe is important to the club strategy, as seen in 2020/21, when the Swiss Ramble estimates they earned €32m for winning the Europa League. Still a lot less than the Spanish representatives in the Champions League received, e.g. Real Madrid got more than three times as much with €111m. They will earn big money from this season’s Champions League. The Swiss Ramble’s model suggests around €78m, though is restricted for two reasons: (a) nothing from first half of TV pool, as qualified via Europa League...