Published yesterday was the Deloitte Football Money League, based on football clubs’ revenues, excluding transfer fees, and Newcastle just made it in 20th place – after being in 17th and 13th in the preceding two seasons.
While Newcastle dropped to 20th place this was of course for last season, when we were relegated, and we’ll not be in the top 20 for this season – obviously.
And it’s the two top Spanish clubs, Real Madrid and Barcelona, who secure the top spots but that seems to be because of the decline of the pound sterling against the euro.
Real Madrid top the list at £341.9M and Barcelona had £311.7M and overtook Manchester United.
Manchester United, who have over £700M of debt, are in 3rd place with £278.5M and Bayern Munich of Germany are in 4th place with £246.6M.
Arsenal move above Chelsea to 5th place, with a 7% rise in revenues to £224M compared to £206M for the Blues.
Real Madrid have led the list for the last five years.
Here’s the list with Newcastle United just making it in 20th place. Last year’s positions are in brackets:
1 (1) Real Madrid £341.9M
2 (3) Barcelona £311.7M
3 (2) Man Utd £278.5M
4 (4) Bayern Munich £246.6M
5 (6) Arsenal £224M
6 (5) Chelsea £206.4M
7 (8) Liverpool £184.8M
8 (11) Juventus £173.1M
9 (10) Internazionale £167.4M
10 (7) AC Milan £167.4M
11 (15) Hamburg £124.9M
12 (9) Roma £124.7M
13 (12) Lyon £118.9M
14 (16) Marseille £113.5M
15 (14) Tottenham £113M
16 (13) Schalke £106M
17 (n/a) Werder Bremen £97.7M
18 (20) B Dortmund £88.1M
19 (n/a) Man City £87M
20 (17) Newcastle £86M
While we will drop out of th list next year because our revenues are estimated around the £50M mark for this season, if we get promoted in May look for us to re-enter the list higher than 20th place in a couple of years.
Comments welcome.
15 comments so far
Captain Beefheart
Mar 2, 2010 at 11:30 AM
Comment #1Despite being in the Fizzy, NUFC manage to remain in the top 20 richest clubs.. That’s gotta be unique? And NUST really think Ashley will let them take over for tuppence ha’penny and a lot of cheap rhetoric?
Just look at the way the plump one’s steamrollering a backdoor takeover for Blacks Leisure at the moment. Personally, I think if we didn’t have such a history with MA we would want someone like him in charge. If he was a player, like many of our Prem flops such as Colo, we would have to grudgingly admit he’s had a pretty good season so far on balance despite he recession….
If we had Ridsdale then we really would have cause to complain – and worry!! OK, I’m getting off the fence. I was vehemently anti-Ashley for a long time, but I think he could end up being the best thing that happened to this club since Sir Bobby arrived.
We certainly won’t ever go into administration with his millions, and that’s gotta to be worth at least three wins a season.
Did I really say that?
Ed Harrison
Mar 2, 2010 at 11:37 AM
Comment #2Captain Beefheart – it’s for last season when we were in the PL.
We’ll drop out this season because our revenues will only be around £50M – but we’re coming back big time (hopefully) if we can get promoted in May.
Captain Beefheart
Mar 2, 2010 at 11:43 AM
Comment #3Hi Ed,
I appreciate that, but how many relegated teams will figure in a world top 20? They would be hard pushed to make a English top 20. My point remains, we have a solid financial base (not least from fans) but a one that needs proper sustainable management. Back in the Prem we will soon be be back in this list, and if back in Europe we will be pushing the top 10.
It is an indication of the true size of this club and its importance to the Geordie Diaspora, we cannot afford to trust it to bungling amateurs with good intentions – which is why I think it’s time to get behind Ashley.
Great blog, nice to see it back by the way!
toongloom
Mar 2, 2010 at 11:49 AM
Comment #4wow this is a massive pleasant surprise!! Im with captain beefheart, Mike has made some shocking decisions so far since he took over but i’ll forgive him if he sticks with us and builds for the future. Wat i hope he doesnt do is put the club up for sale at end of season and drag tht over the summer because we need as much time as possible to prepare for next season.
I think £20m-£25m with 1/2 going out should be enough to keep us up next year. and thts covered by the increase in tv revenue and gate sales easily
Does anybody know where we stood in the rankings last yr before we got relegated?
lborotoon
Mar 2, 2010 at 12:13 PM
Comment #5captain beefheart,
surely the fact that we are in the worlds top 20 richest clubs last season and still got relegated shows what a catastrophic season the clubs hierarchy had – by somehow managing to get a club with such a healthy income relegated.
toongloom
Mar 2, 2010 at 12:27 PM
Comment #6the hierarachy did not get us relegated, the players did. We had players who didnt not want to play football for newcastle but came to earn ridiculous wages. Most of these high earners were bought before ashely came. Ashley last season gave us keegan because we didnt like alardyce, he appointed sherear because we wanted him. I can remember even sherear end of last season when he was distraught when he went down he said its no1 elses fault except the players! and now them greedy players are gone so we can build again
derekm
Mar 2, 2010 at 12:28 PM
Comment #7I am another who hopes Ashley stays and builds on the awful experiences he has suffered with his mistakes.
One point – everyone made such a howl about renaming the ground to sports direct @ etc – but Ashley’s companies had a great year in 2009, and with world cup year he knows he’ll have an even better one. When one company you own makes large profits the trick is to move funds around the empire to avoid paying tax on it – surely being able to move Sports direct profits into NUFC by means of stadium sponsorship is simply good business practice? It also probably funded some of the January signings, so why can’t we now get behind Ashley and forgive his errors? He has’nt done a lot wrong this season bearing in mind where the club is now, and who knows what we might get lumbered with if he seeks to sell in the summer – look at all the supposed white knights who rode into Portsmouth!
MacToon
Mar 2, 2010 at 12:41 PM
Comment #8FFS had us in debt (apparantly) to the tune of £30 million a year, after all the changes, losing high earners from the club, Paying off debts (by personal loans from Ashley) and not having the interest to pay on the loans, we are still losing £20 million a year….. apparantly!
Not that great an improvement considering what’s happened at the club in the last 18 months!
toongloom
Mar 2, 2010 at 12:44 PM
Comment #9Dereken,
your bang on right. Theres not many people or consortiums out there who enough money to buy football clubs. If they did then the like of liverpool, man u, would not be in multi millions of debt. Ashely has made mistakes, no1 can argue tht, but had he not bought us back then, then right now we would be where pompey are!!
komfort
Mar 2, 2010 at 12:55 PM
Comment #10dereken , where did you read that about ashley’s companies having a great year in 2009 ? can you show me as i’d be interested in reading it…also is’nt sportsdirect a plc & therefore the profits go to the share holders by the way of dividends ?
lesh
Mar 2, 2010 at 1:03 PM
Comment #11Komfort, you’re correct in sayin that Sports Direct is a plc – Ashley may well have the largest shareholing though.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sports_Direct
Would you believe that himself is a former County level squash coach?
komfort
Mar 2, 2010 at 1:24 PM
Comment #12lesh…county level squash coach !…..well if that’s the case he’ll certianly know how to duck & dive…..but i doubt it will help him with the investigations against him from the….office of fair trading for price fixing & the serious fraud office…
…seems like a lovely man.
Captain Beefheart
Mar 2, 2010 at 1:46 PM
Comment #13As my Grandfather once said, “there are honest men and there are rich men, but there are no honest, rich men..”
All businessmen sail close to the wind with deals, most (including Branson) have been investigated at one point or other, but with Ashley we know his good and his bad points – and for all the justified criticism hurled at him following the relegation, he has simply got on and put a sensible plan into action. Consequently, we are now top and have a decreasing loan to value ratio, something Sir John Hall never achieved..
We are not out of the woods, and Ashley is never going to my favourite Squash coach, but he IS precisely the type of owner / chairman we need not least because he understands how to handle millions, and his other interests keep him out of toon for much of the time. Give him a five year contract I say, and stop the guffawing in his direction, you know it makes sense (we might even learn to love him, ha, ha… 8)
komfort
Mar 2, 2010 at 2:16 PM
Comment #14let’s wait and see if you feel the same way about him this time next year…….that’s if he’s still with us and not serving a five year contract in durham nic….
….i know which i’d prefer 🙂
lesh
Mar 2, 2010 at 4:00 PM
Comment #15Cap’n, I agree with you and yes, business wealth and angelic behaviour very rarely go hand-in-hand.
As you say, MA’s used to handling megabucks and despite his gaffes with us, his much wanting people-managment skills, I’ll go along with you and say that he’s done us more good than harm.
We are and as long as he stays, will be in better financial shape than under FFS and SJH.
However, if he’s at the helm if/ when we go up, then despite fans’ misgivings, I do believe he deserves a massive round of appreciation from the fans whether on:
24 April (v Ipswich at home),
2 May (QPR away) or after really stretching our nerves at the
22 May (Play off final).
Maybe we need to really cheer the lads to aim for the Ipswich match, as champions!