The BookKeeper: Projecting how close Premier League teams are to UEFA’s spending limits
UEFA’s Champions League is back and, for all the money on offer at FIFA’s Club World Cup in the summer, the competition that ultimately crowns Europe’s best team remains the most lucrative tournament in club football.
This season €2.437billion (£2.1bn at today’s rate) will be dished out to the 36 teams competing in the league phase and beyond. Plenty of that, in turn, should make its way back to England; six of the 36 competing clubs this season hail from the Premier League.
Add in two more in the Europa League, which gets underway in a week’s time, and then one in the Conference League (two weeks from now) and you arrive at nine different English clubs, or nearly half the top tier, partaking in European football this season. It is another sign of the Premier League’s growing dominance.
It also means those nine clubs — Arsenal, Aston Villa, Chelsea, Crystal Palace, Liverpool, Manchester City, Newcastle United, Nottingham Forest and Tottenham Hotspur — must each abide by a different set of financial strictures to their remaining 11 domestic peers this season.
The Athletic recently outlined what UEFA’s primary two financial regulations — the football earnings rule and the squad cost rule — entail. The former is largely in line with the profit and sustainability (PSR) loss limits the Premier League holds its clubs to; the latter is more directly targeted at limiting expenditure and, though Premier League clubs have long discussed shifting to a squad cost rule of their own, it continues to operate ‘in shadow’ domestically for the second successive year.
UEFA’s football earnings rule limits clubs to €60million (£51.9m at today’s rate) in losses over a three-year period, albeit that limit can be upped by €10m per year (to a maximum total of €90m across a given assessment period) if clubs meet each of four conditions UEFA deem representative of good financial health. They are: positive equity; a quick ratio — current assets, less stock, divided by current liabilities — of one or above; a sustainable debt ratio, relative to income; and the club is a ‘going concern’ (i.e. not imminently going out of business).
English clubs are mostly fine on three of those but it’s condition two, the quick ratio, where they all fall down. Principally due to high transfer debt, current liabilities exceeded current assets at eight of the nine clubs in both 2022-23 and 2023-24. The one exception was Manchester City in 2023-24. In other words, none of them qualify for an extra €30m in loss allowance. City will have a loss limit of €70m (around £60m); the rest can book a maximum loss of €60m (£52m) from 2022-25.
Estimates and assumptions are required when considering club losses, as we don’t have their 2024-25 accounts yet. We also tend not to have sight of what deductions can be made for ‘good’ expenditure. As a result, any figures or projections referenced here are just that — projections — and should not be relied upon as statements of fact.
That’s even more the case when it comes to a club’s squad cost ratios (SCR). UEFA’s SCR runs annually, not in line with accounting periods, making it even more difficult to ascertain. Clubs also tend to just publish their total wage figure rather than break it down to the playing squad level, again making outside projections difficult.
A look at clubs’ wages and amortisation costs to revenue is indicative, though still not representative of where they’ll land on UEFA SCR. In the graphic above only Spurs’ combined wages and amortisation to revenue in 2023-24 was lower than 70 per cent, which would imply the remaining eight clubs might be up against the limit going forward.
If only it were that simple to determine. As we’ll see, there are intricacies across the board and each club’s position is unique. Again, we should stress the figures are estimates. For SCR, they have to be: the clubs themselves won’t know their exact position until the end of 2025.
The Athletic has contacted each club with our findings and where they responded these responses have been taken into account.
Arsenal
Football earnings rule
Arsenal lost £69.8m (€80.5m) across the first two years of the current assessment cycle, though that was before any deductions for allowable expenditure on infrastructure, youth and community development and women’s football. Those are sizeable. Removing them actually leaves the club in a profitable football earnings position across 2022-23 and 2023-24.
Arsenal’s bottom line was expected to be further improved in 2024-25, with a small pre-tax profit possible, per our calculations. Extra TV money from the Champions League combined with continued commercial growth should have seen 2023-24’s £17.7m pre-tax loss reduce; a relatively quiet 2024 summer transfer window, at least by recent standards, ensured an amortisation bill which has risen significantly over the last half-decade at least slowed its growth.
That wasn’t the case this summer, but the business done then didn’t impact Arsenal’s football earnings calculation for this season, with their accounting cut-off date landing on 31 May.
The Athletic projects a small profit for 2024-25 which, combined with those deductions turning previous losses into an estimated football earnings profit, leaves the North London side firmly in the black for the three-year cycle. They should be far from any trouble with the football earnings rule.
Squad cost rule
Arsenal were known to be wary of breaching the squad cost rule as the end of the transfer window approached, and their inability to net any sizeable sales over the summer has, we expect, left their SCR position on a knife edge.
They were able to move out several players on loan, with Jakub Kiwior, Oleksandr Zinchenko, Fabio Vieira and Reiss Nelson all securing temporary deadline day moves. Those departures will produce some wage savings over the final four months of the year, alongside some loan fees, but they haven’t moved the dial in the way a significant sale would have.
Arsenal’s wages to revenue was just 52 per cent in 2023-24, but there have been significant contract renewals and new additions since. Riccardo Calafiori, Mikel Merino, Martin Zubimendi, Eberechi Eze, Viktor Gyokeres, Noni Madueke, Cristhian Mosquera, Christian Norgaard, Kepa Arrizabalaga and Piero Hincapie have all joined the first-team squad since those last accounts were released, adding costs in both wages and amortisation. Youngsters Myles Lewis-Skelly and Ethan Nwaneri have signed new contracts with notable salary increases.
The departures of Thomas Partey and Jorginho provided noteworthy offsets to the wage bill this summer, but our projections still leave Arsenal close to the wire, even as the club banked significant Champions League income in the first half of this year. The Athletic’s current projection has Arsenal’s SCR at around 68 per cent. That is under the 70 per cent limit but leaves little room for error in our assumptions. It is easy to see why the matter was a live one this summer.
Only those inside the Emirates know the true position, and it’s also true it isn’t set in stone yet. The summer window offered the last chance for player sales to improve Arsenal’s 2025 SCR figure, but the coming months could see revenue boosted. Six Champions League group games will take place before we reach 2026, with £1.8m (€2.1m) available for each victory. Winning all of those would do Arsenal’s tight SCR position some good.
Aston Villa
Football earnings rule
Aston Villa breached the football earnings rule last season, which wasn’t too surprising given they lost £206m (€238m) pre-tax across 2022-23 and 2023-24.
That was before deductions for allowable costs, but also before any adjustments UEFA probably enforced upon them for the numerous player ‘swap’ deals they engaged in in June 2024. Douglas Luiz’s move to Juventus generated significant profit and helped Villa stave off a Premier League PSR breach, but the arrivals of Samuel Iling-Junior and Enzo Barrenechea from Turin mean the European governing body likely caused them to revise such profit downwards in their 2023-24 figures. There were other similar deals.
Villa generated significant revenue en route to the Champions League quarter-finals earlier this year, and have been active sellers in recent windows. As a result of the sales of Jhon Duran, Cameron Archer, Jaden Philogene and Moussa Diaby, Villa will have improved on their 2023-24 player sale profits of £64.7m, not least because of the latter figure included amounts UEFA likely reduced in the football earnings calculation.
The Athletic projects Villa’s loss dropped significantly in 2024-25; a small profit might even have been made. That on its own wouldn’t be sufficient to offset the big losses of two years prior but, as a result of entering into that Settlement Agreement, it doesn’t need to.
Individuals with knowledge of how the agreements work, speaking on the condition of anonymity so they could discuss sensitive information, say that Villa’s football earnings calculation for this season’s assessment will only cover the 2024-25 season. Villa could have lost a maximum of €60m, provided €55m of that was covered by secure funding. We expect Villa were nowhere near that level of loss in 2024-25, ensuring compliance with the football earnings rule under the terms of their Settlement Agreement.
Squad cost rule
Villa also breached the squad cost rule in 2024, exceeding UEFA’s 80 per cent limit. The lowering to 70 per cent is a good reason for Villa’s lack of summer splurging; they were the lowest spending Premier League club on a gross basis.
That lack of spending hasn’t been uniform across 2025 though. January saw the arrival of three loan players — Marcus Rashford, Marco Asensio and Axel Disasi — who added significantly to the wage bill even while only at Villa Park for only half a season. Donyell Malen signed permanently too.
Emery’s side have spent heavily in recent years but should avoid any ban (Photo: Vince Mignott/MB Media/Getty Images)
Wage savings have been made elsewhere and, as mentioned, player profits too. Yet with the latter being averaged over the past three years, meaning only a third of an individual deal’s profit counts toward a given year’s SCR calculation, and combined with no Champions League income in the second half of 2025, it looks likely Villa have again breached. The Athletic projects their squad cost ratio as notably lower than the 80 per cent mark it exceeded in 2024, but still above 70 per cent.
The more positive thing for Villa is their Settlement Agreement makes no reference of extra punishment for another breach of SCR; breaching the football earnings rule would have been far more of a risk for them. To that end, if they are in breach they can expect another fine to go alongside the ones already agreed.
List A transfer balance
Villa didn’t adhere to either of those rules last season, copping an €11m (£9.5m) fine for their troubles. That fine could rise by a further €15m (£12.9m) if Villa fail to keep to the terms agreed in their Settlement Agreement with UEFA, which covers the next three years.
As part of that agreement, Villa accepted a condition whereby players could only be added to their ‘List A’ squad for UEFA competition if their List A transfer balance — costs saved by players removed from the list, less new costs related to those added to it — was positive, relative to the last submitted list in February of this year. As The Athletic explained recently, a third of profits generated on players removed from the list are also included as part of the transfer balance.
For all their PSR concerns this summer, Villa were able to add a player to their List A overall, with seven names dropping off while eight new ones were brought onboard. New signings Evann Guessand, Victor Lindelof, Harvey Elliott and Jadon Sancho were all included, as was Malen, who notably missed out after signing for the club in January. UEFA have confirmed Villa’s new List A squad complied with the positive transfer balance condition.
Chelsea
Football earnings rule
There’s no real value in estimating Chelsea’s football earnings figure for the three years ending on June 30, 2025: we already know they had a deficit and, as part of the Settlement Agreement they entered into with UEFA earlier this year, they assented to not exceeding what the projected deficit was at the time.
Whatever it was, the number was probably quite large. Chelsea have sizeable deductions for academy costs and the like, but operating losses have topped £200m in each of the two seasons mentioned above. 2024-25 saw significant revenue increases, particularly in TV money; across an improved Premier League finish, their Conference League triumph and the earnings from the FIFA Club World Cup which fell into last season’s accounting year, we estimated a £63m revenue uplift.
Even so, player sales dipped from the club record of £152.5m a year earlier, meaning another loss was inevitable — and confirmed by Chelsea communicating a projected deficit to UEFA. They agreed the settlement deal three days before the end of their 2024-25 accounting period, so it seems a decent bet they’ll have stuck to whatever projected deficit was shared with the European governing body. As detailed in our Aston Villa section, above, only the 2024-25 figure was considered for this season’s assessment.
Trickier could be this coming year. As part of that Settlement Agreement, Chelsea need any loss in 2025-26 to be at or below €60m. That’s a big drop on recent losses, yet they also sold nearly £300m worth of players in the summer. Around £45m in Club World Cup prize money falling into this season will have helped too, as will the money earned from a return to the Champions League — especially if they go deep in the competition.
Failure to meet the 2025-26 target by €20m or loss will see a further proportional fine, up to €20m, handed down. Exceed by more than €20m and UEFA will terminate the Settlement Agreement, leading to a one-year ban from UEFA competition in whichever of the next three seasons Chelsea otherwise qualify.
Sources with knowledge of the situation, speaking anonymously so they could discuss sensitive information, have confirmed to The Athletic the expectation Chelsea will not exceed the loss limit detailed in the Settlement Agreement for 2025-26, in large part because of business already done.
Squad cost rule
Chelsea exceeded the squad cost ratio limit of 80 per cent in 2024, making the task of meeting the lower 70 per cent mark all the more difficult.
Tracking where clubs are at with SCR is tricky anyway; with Chelsea it’s borderline impossible. This summer alone, 14 players left for fees, nine arrived the other way and gross figures on the deals in and out topped half a billion pounds.
Chelsea’s near-£300m in player sales didn’t translate to anywhere near as much as that in player profits, with Christopher Nkunku and Joao Felix in particular likely to have generated a loss rather than a surplus. Meanwhile, continued activity in bringing in new players means the amortisation bill has probably continued to rise since the 2023-24 figures were released.
The counterpoint is so has Chelsea’s revenue — and particularly in 2025. FIFA’s Club World Cup was already a boon to finances; going on to win it banked them around £85m which can be applied in full to their current SCR calculation. Moreover, a return to Champions League football should generate a minimum £50m even before any games are played.
Costs are still big, even if some large wage earners have left in the last two seasons. Chelsea’s squad cost position will remain precarious in future seasons without sustained revenue improvement or continued. But the latter has been so significant in 2025 we project they will avoid a breach of SCR this year, coming in several points under the 70 per cent limit.
List A transfer balance
Chelsea’s Settlement Agreement with UEFA spans the next four years rather than the three of Villa’s, with the financial penalty meted out to Stamford Bridge notably higher than Villa’s too. Chelsea paid a fine of €31m (£26.8m), which could rise by a further €60m (£51.8m) if conditions within the agreement are breached.
One of those conditions was the same List A restriction handed to Villa and, just like them, UEFA has confirmed Chelsea’s recently submitted squad met the positive transfer balance condition. Eight players were moved off Chelsea’s February List A; 10, including expensive new signings Joao Pedro, Jamie Gittens, Alejandro Garnacho, and Jorrel Hato were added.
Crystal Palace
Football earnings rule
Palace were loss-making in both 2022-23 and 2023-24, with their pre-tax result across the two seasons £65.3m (€75.6m) in the red. Like most clubs now, Palace lose money at the operating level: over £20m in each of those two seasons. Unlike plenty of others, they made scarcely anything on player sales to redress the balance.
That changed last season. The sales of Michael Olise, Joachim Andersen and Sam Johnstone generated significant profit at Selhurst Park, which we expect translated to a profitable bottom line, even as Premier League income fell and costs inevitably continued to rise.
Palace’s profit in 2024-25 is unlikely to have been huge but it doesn’t need to have been for the purposes of football earnings compliance. That £65.3m/£75.6m loss in the first two years of the current cycle is before any deductions for infrastructure and the like. Those allowances aren’t massive at Palace but, combined with a profitable 2024-25, The Athletic projects they came in within their football earnings loss limit.
Squad cost rule
Usefully, Palace disclose their player wages — the only Premier League club to do so. That comes in handy when figuring out their squad cost ratio, leaving us less reliant on guessing at how much it costs to employ the rest of the club.
In 2023-24, Palace’s player wages and amortisation as proportion of revenue was 78 per cent, above the UEFA limit but not that far off, and that’s before including player sales. As mentioned, Palace sold well last season, and continued the theme this summer, earning in the region of £50m profit on Eberechi Eze alone.
Player profits are averaged across the past three years in the SCR calculation but, even so, The Athletic projects they mean Palace should come in under the 70 per cent squad cost ratio limit. Those sales had the added benefit of removing some assumed high earners like Olise, Andersen and Eze, as well as Odsonne Edouard, Rob Holding and Jeffrey Schlupp this summer just gone. Assumptions play a big part, but it seems enough to say they’ll be close, but will comply with both of UEFA’s rules this season.
Liverpool
Football earnings rule
Liverpool booked a club record £57.1m loss in 2023-24, on the back of a £9.0m loss in 2022-23. Set against that backdrop, the reigning Premier League champions might have had some worries about breaching UEFA loss limits.
Not in reality. As The Athletic detailed in March, even with a wage bill potentially in the region of £400m once league-winning bonuses and Champions League qualification were factored in, Liverpool were expected to turn a healthy profit in 2024-25. Around £60m in extra European prize money, alongside matchday and commercial increases, should have seen revenue rise from £613.8m in 2023-24 to over the £700m mark.
The combined £66.1m (€76.8m) loss from the previous two seasons was also before any deductions for infrastructure and the likes which, for a club like Liverpool, are significant. Combine that with a profitable season last year and the club had little to worry about when it came to loss limits. The Athletic estimates Liverpool were profitable from a football earnings rule perspective.
Squad cost rule
Liverpool’s huge spending on their squad this summer naturally draws eyes to the matter of compliance with a rule targeted at limiting exactly that. New signings alone have added an estimated £80m in amortisation costs in 2025-26, and that figure will only increase in future years, as this season won’t include a full year’s worth of amortisation for most of those signing (Alexander Isak, for example, didn’t join until September 1). There are significant new wage costs too.
Yet Liverpool will benefit from both matters of timing and action. On the former, with much of their transfer activity taking place after mid-year, less than half of the annual cost impact will be borne in their 2025 SCR calculation. Isak’s contribution to this season’s calculation, for example, will comprise four months’ worth of amortisation and wages rather than a full year. It may also be that his, and others’, signing-on fees are accounted for immediately and included in 2025.
In terms of action, Liverpool have been big sellers this summer, recouping nearly £200m on player sales. Not all of that is profit, and, only one-third of the profit counts toward SCR straightaway, but it still serves to significantly add to an already increased revenue figure. Those sales, along with the full-year impact of high earners like Thiago Alcantara and Joel Matip leaving in 2024, help to offset the big additions to the wage bill this summer too, as well as new deals handed to Virgil van Dijk and Mohamed Salah.
There’s also the important point of Liverpool’s non-playing wage bill. A UEFA report from 2022-23 highlighted the club’s wage bill on other staff exceeded £100m which, even without much of a rise since, dramatically lowers the figure to be included in the club’s SCR calculation. All that considered, The Athletic projects no trouble at all for Liverpool, with an SCR ratio in 2025 in the 55 to 60 per cent region.
Manchester City
Football earnings rule
It’s scarcely worth calculating City’s football earnings position, given how profitable the club was in 2022-23 and 2023-24. Across those two seasons they booked a combined pre-tax profit of £154m (€178m), and that’s before making sizeable deductions for spend on youth development and so on.
City’s trophyless season saw Premier League and UEFA earnings drop by a combined £44m or so, but even that was mostly offset by an estimated £38m earned at FIFA’s Club World Cup this summer. They embarked on a roughly £200m spend in January, but only book half a year’s worth of amortisation costs from that in 2024-25. Continued commercial growth was likely, while any wage bill rise will be restrained by a lack of bonuses relative to previous successful years.
City lost £61m at the operating level in 2023-24, offsetting it with £139m in player sale profits. The latter figure wasn’t so high last season, but it was still hardly small — we estimate it at just below £100m following the sales of Julian Alvarez, Joao Cancelo and Taylor Harwood-Bellis, to name just three.
Add it all together, include those deductions for ‘good’ costs and you arrive at simple conclusion. City had no trouble complying with the football earnings rule, and were significantly profitable across the three-year assessment period.
Squad cost rule
Concurrently, there wasn’t much to worry about from a squad cost perspective, even as they’ve spent over £300m on new players in this calendar year alone. Those signings have added significantly to both the wage bill and City’s transfer fee amortisation, but they did follow a summer in 2024 where nothing was spent on anyone other than Savinho.
What’s more, there have been notable departures too, even if fees this summer were rather smaller than in recent seasons. From a squad cost rule perspective, City have helped offset their incomings by shedding the wages of big earners like Kevin De Bruyne, Ederson, Ilkay Gundogan and Kyle Walker. Jack Grealish, too, is now having much of his big salary covered by Everton for the current season.
City have one of the highest wage bills in world football, and one of the most expensively assembled squads. Yet they were also the second highest earning club in the world in 2023-24, and have for years been formidable sellers of players. The Athletic projects little trouble from a squad cost ratio perspective; we put City’s figure in the range of 60 to 65 per cent for 2025.
Newcastle United
Football earnings rule
Newcastle’s position in terms of UEFA’s loss limits looks precarious, not least as they were only able to avoid a breach of Premier League rules in 2023-24 by undertaking transactions which UEFA made the club discount from its continental submissions. As detailed in the club’s accounts for that season, Newcastle’s pre-tax loss was £38.1m in their UEFA submissions, £27m higher than the £11.1m shown in the accounts (and in Premier League PSR submissions).
That increase stemmed from UEFA requiring Newcastle reduce player sale profits by £30.4m. The governing body deemed the sale of Elliot Anderson to Nottingham Forest an effective swap for Forest’s Odysseas Vlachodimos, while the sale of Allan Saint-Maximin to Al Ahli, a related party by virtue of also being owned by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, was reduced to nil profit.
Newcastle’s 2022-23 pre-tax loss was also increased in their UEFA submissions, taking the club’s loss over the first two years of the 2022-25 assessment cycle to £122m (€142m). That is before deductions for allowable costs, but those aren’t as substantial as elsewhere; for example, only £8.4m (€9.7m) in depreciation costs were deductible over those first two seasons.
Even with growing matchday and commercial income, and a potentially static wage bill as a result of no Champions League football, it is unlikely Newcastle’s 2024-25 result was sufficiently improved to avoid another notable loss. Operating losses were around £68m in each of the last two seasons, player sale profits were lower last season than the year before (even taking into account 2023-24’s reduction in UEFA submissions), and a £5.5m increase in Premier League distributions was more than offset by the loss of £29.8m in Champions League payouts.
The Athletic projects Newcastle have comfortably breached the €60m three-year loss limit to the end of June 2025, and will, as Aston Villa and Chelsea did before them, likely now face a financial penalty. That is based upon our own judgment of the matter; when asked about actions stemming from future breaches, UEFA advised they cannot comment on hypotheticals.
Squad cost rule
Surety around the squad cost rule is much harder to come by, and Newcastle’s position there has been aided by the transfer drama of this summer. Isak’s departure generated big profit for the club — we reckon in the region of £80m — and while only one-third of that will count toward their 2025 SCR calculation, that’s still a big help.
They’ll also benefit from the removal of Isak’s amortisation and wage costs, though only four months’ worth of savings will apply for 2025. The sales of Lloyd Kelly and Sean Longstaff help too, as do the departures last season of Anderson, Yankuba Minteh and Miguel Almiron, all of whose movements will reduce Newcastle’s cost base from the one we can see in their most recent accounts.
Qualification for the Champions League also guarantees some immediate extra income; The Athletic estimates Newcastle will earn around £30m in UEFA prize money even if they lose all eight group games this season. That doesn’t help their football earnings figure for this season, but any revenue generated up to the end of this year counts within 2025 for SCR purposes.
After making a reasonable allowance for non-player wages, The Athletic projects Newcastle to be on the right side of the 70 per cent marker for UEFA’s squad cost rule, though the number of assumptions involved makes it far from certain. A missed estimate here or there could push them into a breach. Either way, the sale of Isak and its contribution of over £25m profit to this season’s calculation has been important. Without that, a breach of both of UEFA’s rules this season would have been more likely on Tyneside.
Nottingham Forest
Football earnings rule
Forest enjoyed a big jump in Premier League TV money last season, earning £29.2m more than a year prior by finishing seventh and, of course, qualifying for this season’s Europa League.
Yet that still won’t have been enough to return a profitable bottom line. Forest were profitable in 2023-24 but owed that entirely to £100.5m in player profits, without which they’d have been £90m in the pre-tax red. Operating losses at the City Ground were £75m that season, and player costs relative to income were huge; wages and amortisation took up 120 per cent of revenue.
Even with revenue up, and some conservative judgements on the cost of player trading undertaken over the past year, Forest lost a chunk of money last season. Combined with minimal deductions for ‘good’ expenditure, that leaves them a fair way shy of the three-year €60m loss limit. The Athletic projects their football earnings loss could be closer to double that. As with Newcastle, our projection is that a financial penalty looms.
Squad cost rule
Similarly, meeting the squad cost rule in 2025 looks a big ask for Forest. Those player sales which turned the club profitable in 2023-24 were to some extent repeated this summer with the departures of Anthony Elanga and Danilo helping the bottom line, but it is unlikely to have been enough to combat that high wages and amortisation to turnover figure, not least because only a third of this summer’s profits will count towards the 2025 calculation.
Forest’s notable turnover bump last season means they’re on the right track, but they had a long journey to make. At least in the sense of rule compliance, their leap into European competition has come too soon to change that; revenue growth hasn’t yet matched up to the big investments made in the squad since promotion.
Elanga’s exit has eased Forest’s issues but probably not quite enough (Photo: Andrew Kearns – CameraSport via Getty Images)
The club have been very active in the transfer market in recent seasons, meaning our estimate for Forest might be even more assumption-laden than with anyone else. Still, a breach on both of UEFA’s financial rules looks likely at the City Ground this season.
The Athletic projects Forest’s squad cost ratio at around 75 per cent currently, above the 70 per cent limit, would put the club in line for further discussions with UEFA.
Tottenham Hotspur
Football earnings rule
On the face of it, Spurs would be a ripe candidate for breaching loss limits, both at home and abroad. Across 2022-23 and 2023-24, they lost £121m (€139m) pre-tax, and last year’s pitiful Premier League finish meant domestic TV distributions dropped by £36.8m, mostly offsetting what was earned by winning the Europa League. Another loss loomed in 2024-25.
Yet the whopping great caveat to Spurs’ financials is their loss figures include the huge costs of depreciating the club’s new stadium. Depreciation costs totalled £142m (€164m) in the two seasons before last; strip those out and their pre-tax result was £21m (€25m) in the black.
Our deep dive into Spurs’ finances earlier in the year referenced declining cash, and Spurs recently brought forward a big chunk of the money they’re due in Premier League distributions this season, a first for the club. But any financial concerns are cash-based rather than regulatory.
Even with another pre-tax loss likely in 2024-25, the deductions available to Spurs — not just depreciation, but some chunky other costs too — mean we project they are profitable from a football earnings perspective, and well clear of trouble.
Squad cost rule
Similarly, there’s little to worry about on the squad cost rule either. Spurs’ wages to revenue for the entire club, not only the football staff, was just 42 per cent in 2023-24. Adding in amortisation costs only took the total as proportion of revenue to 68 per cent — less than UEFA’s 70 per cent limit, even without adjusting for non-playing staff and adding in prorated player sale profits.
Spurs have spent heavily on transfers in recent years and carry a lot of transfer debt. Their frivolity in the market is a reason behind that aforementioned cash crunch.
But their wage bill relative to income is incredibly low, meaning they really have nothing to worry about when it comes to SCR. One of the biggest drains on cash, the interest paid on the loans taken out to build a new stadium, doesn’t impact their SCR calculation. Some heady wages have been added recently but the club had plenty of room for manoeuvre, even before departures of high-earners like Son Heung-min, Tanguy Ndombele and Ivan Perisic, all of whom have left since the club’s last accounts were published.
To that end, The Athletic projects Spurs to be well below UEFA’s 70 per cent limit, with an estimated squad cost ratio of in the 50 to 55 per cent range for 2025, and probably at the low end too.
