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Premier League football clubs are projected to report record revenues in the upcoming season, driven by format changes to European competitions, including the Champions League, as well as higher ticket prices, stadium capacity and international broadcast deals.
The 20 teams in the English top flight together are forecast to generate nearly £6.4bn of revenues in 2024-25, up almost 7 per cent from the previous season, according to Deloitte’s latest annual review of football finance published on Tuesday.
“Projected increases in Premier League international media rights distributions to clubs will see broadcast revenues rise, whilst the commencement of new sponsorship deals for several clubs is expected to boost commercial revenue,” the report said.
Broadcasting, sponsorship and match day revenues were all expected to contribute to the increase, the consultancy said. Not only were the clubs increasing ticket prices after years of relative stasis, but also newly promoted teams such as Southampton had bigger stadiums than Luton Town, which was relegated in the most recent season, said the report.
The projections provide a welcome boost at a time when the Premier League and many of its clubs are squabbling over cost controls and punishments handed out for breaching loss limits.
For 2023-24, the recently finished season in which Manchester City were crowned champions for a record fourth consecutive year, Deloitte expects flat to slightly lower revenues of about £6bn.
The lack of growth in expected revenues for the season is down to English sides’ underperformance in European competitions, said the report. No English club made it further than the quarterfinals in the Champions League, as Bayern Munich knocked out Arsenal and Real Madrid defeated City on penalties. Even so, new Uefa competition formats coming into play this coming season are expected to result in more matches, boosting revenues for English participants.
Profitability remains elusive for most teams in the English top flight: there were combined pre-tax losses of £685mn in 2022-23, an increase of 14 per cent on the prior season. Still the clubs’ £6bn revenue that season was far ahead of the €3.8bn generated by German rivals, the nearest contenders.
Tim Bridge, lead partner at Deloitte’s sports business group, said the new generation of “increasingly business-minded” investors and owners were trying to find a balance between financial sustainability and meeting fans’ expectations for performances on the pitch.
However, league chief executive Richard Masters has warned the UK government’s plans to introduce an independent regulator to supervise club finances threatens to weaken the competition against European rivals.
Separately, fierce divisions have emerged over the future of the league’s own financial regulations. The rules, which place a cap on the total losses at a club over three seasons at £105mn with exceptions for some investments, have been criticised for holding back ambitious clubs.
Everton and Nottingham Forest were handed points deductions last season for breaching spending rules, while Manchester City is still challenging the league over charges against the champions.
The league and its clubs will test two new approaches to financial regulation next season alongside its existing rules.
Sanctions for breaching spending rules meant that clubs’ final positions in the table did not depend solely on results on the pitch. Deloitte urged in its report that sports regulators would have to be “diligent” when designing financial regulations in order to avoid the uncertainty that has plagued the Premier League.
