February 13 – No other club in history has spent as much as Manchester City to assemble a playing squad. At €878 million Man City have spent €73 million more than Paris St Germain and €131 million more than neighbours Man Utd, though they are having a Red Devil of a time under big spender Jose Mourinho to close that gap.
The data from the CIES Football Observatory looks at Europe’s Big 5 leagues and finds that six of the top 10 most expensive playing squads are in the Premier League – five of the clubs filling the top six places in the premier league table currently. The only one of the top six Premier League clubs outside the top 10 is Tottenham Hotspur.
Manchester City, Paris St-Germain, Manchester United and Barcelona “are the only clubs having spent more than €700 million to assemble their current squad. The economic logic suggests that the next Champions League winners is to be found among these teams” say the CIES authors.
Comparing league averages shows the average amounts invested in transfer fees by league and team varies from “€97 million for the French Ligue 1 to a record high of €291 million at English Premier League level. The figures in the three other competitions of the big-5 are more balanced: €113 million for the German Bundesliga, €124 million for the Italian Serie A and €131 million for the Spanish Liga. In total, 42 clubs out of 98 have a squad recruitment cost of more than €100 million.”
The club with the lowest spending to form their squad is France’s Troyes at €2 million. That barely buys a nice dinner with a good bottle of wine in Manchester these days.
See the full report at http://www.football-observatory.com/IMG/sites/b5wp/2017/214/en/
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