[Football] Premier League's Perfect Financial Storm?

Garry Nelson's teacher · Apr 9, 2020

Clearly we live in testing times; even (especially?) the Prem League is not in a protective bubble.

- falling gate receipts is the most obvious but not the most important part of the mix

- as the likes of us cancel our Sky and BT subs, it's the over-reliance on this dosh as a revenue stream that will potentially sink some clubs:

TV rights were worth £2.45 billion in 2018/9

This comprised as much as 88.% of Bournemouth's income; Albion came in at 79.1%

If the season is cancelled it's estimated that each club could face a TV repayment of up to £762 million

Apparently huge amounts of money is tied up in transfer payments. Cash flow is significantly impaired.

To add other factors into the mix, clubs at all levels will be hit by the drying up of commercial sponsors if the threatened recession hits; and the beloved wealthy owners will (eg the saintly Mike Ashley) find it harder to dig deeply into their pockets. (Even the oil money might dry up; and certain Airline tie-ins don't look rosy right now given the state of the travel industry).

Figure sourced for today Daily Mail (which we get for our elderly neighbours, I hasten to add). TBH even if you divided all the figure by 10 it still makes for grim reading. After the feast, the reckoning?

Gwylan · Apr 9, 2020

Garry Nelson's teacher said:
TV rights were worth £2.45 billion in 2018/9

If the season is cancelled it's estimated that each club could face a TV repayment of up to £762 million

I think you have some figures wrong somewhere - £762m x 20 = £15.24 billion. I can't see clubs having to pay back more than they received - particularly as we're two-thirds of the way through the season

keaton · Apr 9, 2020

I'm more worried about lower level clubs personally.

Also "If the season is cancelled it's estimated that each club could face a TV repayment of up to £762 million" I'm not sure how that figure. Liverpool earned the most last year from TV rights £250m. Why would they be expected to pay it back three-fold?

Papa Lazarou · Apr 9, 2020

What would be worse for the clubs, cancel this season and look to start afresh in August / Sept with a new season, or try to cobble together a way to complete this season, leaving enough time for half a new season from November or December, prior to the Euros?

Swansman · Apr 9, 2020

Impossible to know how this pan out. Normally you'd expect massive inflation once the crisis is over but if that happens and what consequences that would have in a service economy is anyones guess.

Tom Hark Preston Park · Apr 9, 2020

Fvck the PL basically. They've had their snouts in the trough for far too long already. A correction was long overdue, even if nobody foresaw the nature of that correction. Reckon the lower leagues will bounce back quicker than the bloated excesses of the PL because in the end most genuine football fans just want to support their local team and their local community

amexer · Apr 9, 2020

Compared to others no problem with PL. When restarts each club will be back to getting £130m plus. Any shortfall can be sorted out by all reducing next seasons transfer budget. Albion have spent £60m plus a season and have no doubt supporters will understand if this has to be reduced. It wouldnt be worse thing to happen if all clubs had to play with same squads as year before.

Blue Valkyrie · Apr 9, 2020

amexer said:
Compared to others no problem with PL. When restarts each club will be back to getting £130m plus. Any shortfall can be sorted out by all reducing next seasons transfer budget. Albion have spent £60m plus a season and have no doubt supporters will understand if this has to be reduced. It wouldnt be worse thing to happen if all clubs had to play with same squads as year before.

Not the 3 that are relegated...

Unless parachutes are increased to take into account the increased costs incurred this season.

amexer · Apr 9, 2020

Blue Valkyrie said:
Not the 3 that are relegated...

Unless parachutes are increased to take into account the increased costs incurred this season.

I know what you mean but I think they should null and void this season. Tough on some and lucky for others. It is looking impossible to finish this season and play a full season next so why mess up both.

Gwylan · Apr 9, 2020

Papa Lazarou said:
What would be worse for the clubs, cancel this season and look to start afresh in August / Sept with a new season, or try to cobble together a way to complete this season, leaving enough time for half a new season from November or December, prior to the Euros?

If the clubs have to pay back £30m for cancelling this season or £50m for cancelling half of next, I think I can work out what the answer's going to be

Kinky Gerbil · Apr 9, 2020

Gwylan said:
If the clubs have to pay back £30m for cancelling this season or £50m for cancelling half of next, I think I can work out what the answer's going to be

The answer will be that’s how much the next TV deal goes up

Beanstalk · Apr 9, 2020

Tom Hark said:
Fvck the PL basically. They've had their snouts in the trough for far too long already. A correction was long overdue, even if nobody foresaw the nature of that correction. Reckon the lower leagues will bounce back quicker than the bloated excesses of the PL because in the end most genuine football fans just want to support their local team and their local community

If anything, I reckon this will act as a driving force for the Premier League to breakaway from external broadcasters. It's been the long term strategy of the PL to bring their broadcasting rights in-house. With Premier League Productions taking over the video it was only a matter of time anyway. This will take the league to a whole new level of income and with current viewing levels (which arguably will grow when football is back) on an OTT streaming service we'd be looking at a cheaper deal for the consumer, whilst boosting TV revenue for the PL by about 8X (at an accessible price point comparable with Netflix).

This is the death of Sky and BT Sport. And frankly, good riddance. However, if we have learnt anything so far about football, it's that (generally) the money-men in the game are only interested in one thing - money. This will not stop them.

This is a very interesting watch on the matter from a few months ago.

scamander · Apr 9, 2020

I wonder how the break is going to change the relationship fans have with football in general. Will they, or do they, miss it as much? Will they feel that they'd prefer non league etc? For a lot of people it's been a part of their routine and identity. The break might change that.

stewart12 · Apr 9, 2020

scamander said:
I wonder how the break is going to change the relationship fans have with football in general. Will they, or do they, miss it as much? Will they feel that they'd prefer non league etc? For a lot of people it's been a part of their routine and identity. The break might change that.

I'm already going that way. I've been to more non-league games than Brighton games this season

Harry Wilson's tackle · Apr 9, 2020

Papa Lazarou said:
What would be worse for the clubs, cancel this season and look to start afresh in August / Sept with a new season, or try to cobble together a way to complete this season, leaving enough time for half a new season from November or December, prior to the Euros?

The first thing to decide is when to start the new season. I have suggested that the only sensible time to do this is end of Jan 2021. This is partly to fit in with the Catarrh world cup, partly because the PL can't go it alone and will need to align with all the UK leagues and the European leagues, and just the faffing about will take months.

Once that's done we can decide what to do about the 2019-20 season. Finish it off if there is time (in October/November maybe) or bin it.

I absolutely can't see football restarting till September at the very earliest, and that means we have a vaccine for COV-19 AND the new COV-20 in place (flu viruses, as you will know, mutate every year).

Personally I'd like to see the Catarrh world cup binned. We could do without a year of qualifiers and an absurdly timed tournament, especially one bought by flagrant greasing and bribery.

Harry Wilson's tackle · Apr 9, 2020

Tom Hark said:
Fvck the PL basically. They've had their snouts in the trough for far too long already. A correction was long overdue, even if nobody foresaw the nature of that correction. Reckon the lower leagues will bounce back quicker than the bloated excesses of the PL because in the end most genuine football fans just want to support their local team and their local community

Indeed. Albeit most football consumers (the TV audiences) are not genuine fans.

I am a bit surprised by comments by others on this thread that the smaller clubs will fare better than PL clubs during this period. Without major assistance I can see 20 clubs from the championship down to the conference going bust. I'm amazed that only Sunderland and one other club have furloughed their playing staff so far (this may have changed since yesterday). I can only assume some chairmen are still under the forlorn delusion the season may restart in May.

ManOfSussex · Apr 9, 2020

scamander said:
I wonder how the break is going to change the relationship fans have with football in general. Will they, or do they, miss it as much? Will they feel that they'd prefer non league etc? For a lot of people it's been a part of their routine and identity. The break might change that.

I also wonder how it'll change anything globally in terms of The Premier League's appeal. A lot of people won't have the money around the world to subscribe to watch it like they used to, shirts won't be bought for the big clubs, Premier League tourists won't be jetting in in the numbers they were and have the disposable income they used to etc, etc - there's a lot of knock on effects to consider. I wonder if The Chinese get their Super League going months before the European leagues if they'll cash in, or not.

Gwylan · Apr 9, 2020

Harry Wilson's tackle said:
The first thing to decide is when to start the new season. I have suggested that the only sensible time to do this is end of Jan 2021.

That would mean scrapping the Euros. It's already been postponed once and I really can't see UEFA scrapping it entirely, it makes a LOT of money.

Green Cross Code Man · Apr 9, 2020

Gwylan said:
That would mean scrapping the Euros. It's already been postponed once and I really can't see UEFA scrapping it entirely, it makes a LOT of money.

They should just have a euros for amateurs or scrap it. In fact scrap all national teams.

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