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Region’s football clubs cling to top tier coattails

THE region’s three biggest football clubs generated revenue of almost £210m in the 2008/09 season, making up 8% of the total sales earnings of the 92 professional clubs in England, new figures have revealed.

As it battled against relegation and unrest in the stands, Newcastle United endured a 15% drop in revenue on the previous season but remained the tenth biggest earner in the Premier League with £86.1m.

Meanwhile, the Deloitte figures show that Sunderland enjoyed a 2% rise in sales to £64.6m, placing it the 12th in the top tiers financial league,

Despite its plunge towards the bottom of the table Middlesbrough saw a 21% gain to £58m, ranking it in 15th place in the report.

Premier League clubs’ revenue reached a record £1,981m in 2008/09 and will have exceeded £2bn in the 2009/10 season, according to the Annual Review of Football Finance from Deloitte.

The new broadcast contracts will drive a further increase in revenues to £2.2bn in 2010/11. In total, the Top 92 English clubs’ saw revenues increase by £100m to over £2.5bn.

Dan Jones, partner in the Sports Business Group at Deloitte, said: “Despite the sharp economic contraction, Premier League clubs were able to increase revenues by 3% in 2008/09. Whilst commercial income fell marginally (1%), both matchday and broadcasting revenues increased.

“For the 2009/10 season just ended, combined attendances for the Premier League and Football League exceeded 30 million – a level not seen since well before the introduction of all seated stadia.

“When you factor in the recently negotiated Premier League overseas broadcast deals, which come into effect from 2010/11, football has shown remarkable recession resistance during these difficult economic times.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .