With FC Bayern & BVB: Increasing player salaries according to UEFA report

Bayern in top 6, BVB in 11th place

The corona pandemic has caused the top clubs in European football to lose around 7 billion euros in revenue. That is the result of the UEFA Benchmarking Report, a study of over 700 clubs from the 54 top leagues. After losses of around 3 billion euros in 2020, another 4 billion were added in 2021. The two reporting periods largely cover the 2019/20 and 2020/21 seasons.

The largest losses resulted from the lower or missing ticket income during the pandemic in the amount of 4.4 billion euros. The sponsorship losses amounted to 1.7 billion euros, plus losses from the TV rights amounting to around 900 million euros.

Despite the losses, club player salaries have risen by an average of two percent a year. This item in the clubs’ balance sheets already accounted for 56 percent of income. For comparison: in 2013 only 42 percent of the revenue was used for player salaries. In the Bundesliga, salaries rose by one percent to 1.416 billion euros, which corresponds to 59 percent of revenue. The employees in the clubs collected 398 million euros. The 18 clubs in the 2020/21 season spent 59 percent of their income on salaries.

This item is highest in the French Ligue 1 with 83 percent, followed by the Italian Serie A with 78 percent – both invested in total figures with 1.048 billion and 1.303 billion euros but less than the Bundesliga clubs for the salaries of professionals. In Italy, the number fell by twelve percentage points compared to 2019/20. The salary level is highest in LaLiga (1.808 billion) and Premier League (2.867 billion), with the gap between the English upper house and the rest of Europe being enormous. The Premier League also had the highest increase of the top five leagues in this respect, up four percentage points to 73 per cent. Like the Bundesliga, LaLiga was one percentage point.

In a European comparison, Germany is behind England and Spain. pic.twitter.com/fjr4tkHBs2

— Chaled Nahar (@ChaledNahar) February 3, 2022

Player salaries of the top clubs: FC Bayern in 6th place, increase at BVB

For the 20 clubs with the highest wage spending, the ratio of minus and plus is mixed compared to 2019/20. At that point in time, despite a drop of ten percent compared to the previous year to 393 million euros for players and 94 million for employees, the front runner was FC Barcelona, ​​which has once again adjusted its salary level significantly downwards since this season due to its poor financial situation.

FC Bayern Munich spent EUR 262 million on players and EUR 78 million on employees, five percent less than in the same period. This places the German record champions just behind the top 5, which starts with Liverpool FC (up 6% overall to 371 million) and ahead of clubs such as Manchester United, Chelsea FC and Juventus Turin, each of which is down between nine and 19 percent . Borussia Dortmund is one of the clubs with an increasing salary level (+5% to 215 million) and comes eleventh in an international comparison. The figures are also remarkable for AS Roma and Leicester City, who in 2020/21 spent more on salaries than they earned this year – 112 percent (158 million) and 105 percent (180 million). In comparison, FC Bayern and BVB spent comparatively “little” on salaries with 54 percent and 58 percent of their income, respectively. The clubs Paris Saint-Germain and Manchester City, which are supported by state investors, had the highest growth rates of ten and twelve percent.

For FY2021 alone, clubs’ debt increased by €75m, a 15 per cent increase. Clubs from Spain, France, Italy and Turkey were primarily responsible for the increase.

Every league in Europe has been impacted by the pandemic.

The new UEFA European Club Footballing Landscape report estimates overall losses of €7bn, but more than €2bn has been saved by rearranging competition calendars.

Full report: https://t.co/W3c5rL2GaZ pic.twitter.com/5JbNotuWil

— UEFA (@UEFA) February 3, 2022

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