Manchester City have been knocked off their financial perch by Real Madrid in the annual Deloitte Football Money League, despite winning the treble last season.
There was another surprise in the report, which found that the revenue of the top 20 richest men’s clubs rose by 14% to £9bn last season, as Tottenham overtook Chelsea to become the richest club in London.
Elsewhere the brakes have been put on the extent of Premier League domination, with only eight English clubs making the top 20 compared with 11 in 2021-22.
Liverpool’s poor performances on the pitch led to them dropping from third to seventh, the biggest fall of any club in the top 20, after their revenue dropped from £594.3m to £593.8m. Manchester United (£649m) slipped one place to fifth, while Tottenham (£549m) moved up to eighth ahead of Chelsea (£513m) in ninth and Arsenal (£463m) in 10th. Leicester City, Leeds United and Everton dropped out of the top 20 and were replaced by Eintracht Frankfurt, Napoli and Marseille.
“It shows that the Premier League can’t rest on its laurels,” said Tim Bridge, lead partner in Deloitte’s Sports Business Group. “It’s worth noting that while domestic TV rights have risen slightly, the league has had to give away more matches to achieve that.”
Madrid returned to top spot after increasing their revenues by £119m to £723m off the back of sellout crowds, strong retail performances and increased sponsorship income.
City also performed strongly and made a record £718m in revenues during the 2021-22 season. Bridgeindicated that they were held back slightly by their 53,400-seat stadium.
“City’s match-day revenue is €83m [£71m],” he said. “But the question is how they can kick over the €100m revenue marker, which is the threshold of clubs with innovative new stadiums. Real Madrid and Barcelona will be way over that figure in the future, and Tottenham are significantly over it now.”
Barcelona were the top-earning women’s club in Deloitte’s rankings, which focuses on European teams outside of Scandinavia, with £11.6m in revenue.
Manchester United were second with £7m, although that figure includes revenues from a combined kit sponsorship deal with the men’s team. Manchester City (£4.6m), Chelsea (£3.5m) and Tottenham (£2.3m) made the top 10. Of the top 15 women’s clubs in Deloitte’s analysis, the average revenue stood at £3.68m, a 61% increase.
“We’re in a period of rapid growth,” Bridge said. “But maybe the business model, and the way that the game is structured, needs to be different to the men’s.
“We shouldn’t be shy in saying that broadcast revenue may not fundamentally predict the growth of the women’s game in the future. The power of the athlete, and the ability to be a female role model and appeal to major corporations, should also be an extremely compelling story. So it’s exciting times.”