The financial rewards of the Champions League

by

Juventus will earn €115m if they win the Champions League (€98m up to now) while Real Madrid will earn €82m (€67m up to now).   Barcelona have earned €59m. These figures come from the author of the Swiss Ramble blog.

In the Premier League, Leicester City earned €78m through their progress to the quarter finals.  Arsenal earned €62m, indicating how much they stand to lose if they do not qualify this year.  Manchester City brought in €48m and Tottenham Hotspur €42m.

Eisner wants 100 per cent stake in Pompey

by

Former Walt Disney chief executive Michael Eisner and his Tornante investment group wants to purchase a 100 per cent stake in Portsmouth. He is willing to pay £5.67m.

The Pompey Supporters Trust (PST) control 48 per cent of the shares.  Tornante have made a heritage share proposal which would allow the protection of certain identified issues and vetoes exercised by the PST.

Chinese interest in Palace

by

Crystal Palace could be the latest club to fall into Chinese ownership.   There has been interest from Double Edged Sports (Desports), a Chinese marketing company that wants to acquire another football club after purchasing La Liga’s Granada last year.

The rush to China

by

Barcelona is the latest European football club to invest in China on the back of President Xi Jinping’s plans for a football revolution.  They have opened a €4m complex featuring a football school, Barcelona shop and fan zone on the island of Hainan.  They believe that revenues from China will be critical to Barcelona’s target of generating €1bn of revenue by 2021, up from €679m in the 2015/16 season.

Tax raids on Premiership clubs

by

The relationship between the tax authorites and football has been a difficult one in recent years.   There was the controversy over payments for players ‘image rights’ while the tendency of clubs in financial difficulties to use their tax payments as a de facto credit card also gave rise to resentments.  

In recent years HMRC has collected more than £80m in additional tax payments from clubs, players and agents following probes into ‘image rights’ payments through which parties to a transfer can make large tax savings.

Football and gambling

by

Views can differ about the harshness of the punishment on Joey Barton for breaking betting rules for players which effectively sent him into early retirement.   However, a bigger issue is the whole relationship between football and the betting industry.

Half of Premier League clubs have gambling firms as shirt sponsors and most of them have gambling partners.

New offer for Coventry City

by

A new offer for Coventry City has been made by a consortium of local businessmen.   It includes plans for fan involvement.

It was recently suggested that the Australian consortium reported to be interested in Charlton Athletic had also taken a look at the Sky Blues.

Despite their mismanagement of the club, Sisu has never shown any willingness to sell up.