Shropshire Star

Record revenues push Premier League clubs to new heights of spending

Clubs in England’s top flight spent a record £1.430billion on transfers this summer.

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Premier League clubs are heading towards £5billion in combined annual revenues, and they continue to invest record amounts in new playing talent.

According to Deloitte’s Sports Business Group, the clubs have set new benchmarks for spending in a summer window, single season, calendar year and transfer deadline day.

Here are Deloitte’s key findings after the summer transfer window closed in England:

:: Premier League clubs spent a record £1.430billion on transfers this summer, an increase from last year’s previous high of £1.165billion.

:: That breaks down to an average summer spend per club of £71million, up from last year’s £58million.

:: Thursday’s transfer deadline day outlay exceeded £210million, beating the record set last summer of £155million.

Premier League statistics for 2016 show a net summer spend of £636million, in part because it considers Manchester City's signing of Gabriel Jesus as a winter 2017 purchase (Martin Rickett/PA)
Manchester City forward Gabriel Jesus (Martin Rickett/PA)

:: Deloitte reports the clubs’ net expenditure fell slightly, however, from last summer’s record £685million to £665million this year. The Premier League’s own statistics for 2016 show a net summer spend of £636million, in part because it considers Manchester City’s signing of Gabriel Jesus as a winter 2017 purchase, whereas Deloitte lists him in the summer when the deal was announced.

:: Deloitte estimates Manchester City were the league’s top summer 2017 spenders at £215million, ahead of Chelsea on £180million, Manchester United at £145million and Everton on £145million.

:: Only four clubs – Arsenal, Burnley, Stoke and Swansea – made money on their transfer dealings.

Paris St Germain's world-record signing of Neymar was not enough to push Ligue 1 spending anywhere near Premier League levels (Kamil Zihnioglu/AP)
Paris St Germain’s world-record signing of Neymar was not enough to push Ligue 1 spending anywhere near Premier League levels (Kamil Zihnioglu/AP)

:: Premier League clubs spent a record £770million on buying players from overseas and combined spent almost twice as much the next highest spender, Serie A. Despite Paris St Germain’s world-record signing of Neymar, Ligue 1’s clubs spent less than half the amount of their English counterparts.

:: Championship clubs paid out £195million on players this summer, down from 2016’s £215million.

:: Since the first transfer window in January 2003, Premier League clubs have shelled out more than £10.3billion on players, with 84 per cent of this spent in the summer windows.

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