Chelsea’s squad at the end of the 2024 financial year was the costliest ever assembled, according to a new UEFA report.
The big-spending Blues’ squad was worth an astonishing 1.66 billion euros (£1.39bn), eclipsing the previous highest recorded by Real Madrid in 2020 (£1.12bn).
UEFA’s European Club Finance and Investment Landscape Report, published on Thursday, found four clubs had squads worth one billion euros or more in 2024 – Chelsea, Manchester City, Manchester United and Arsenal.
The Premier League’s financial might was underlined by the fact that nine of the 20 most expensive squads in 2024 have been assembled in England, with West Ham’s costing more than Barcelona’s or AC Milan’s.
There were also nine English clubs in the top 20 in Europe based on the size of their total wage bill.
Manchester City were second on 554 million euros (£464.5m), behind only Paris St Germain on 658m euros (£551.7m).
Among the top 20 clubs, the report found the share of revenue absorbed by wages ranged from 42 per cent at Tottenham to 91 per cent at Aston Villa.
Player wage growth was at 4.5 per cent among the early reporting clubs for 2024 compared to 2023 – considerably below the revenue growth level – as teams work to comply with UEFA’s squad cost rules, which from next season will limit spending on player wages, transfer and agents’ fees to 70 per cent of revenue.
A sharp increase in the wages of technical and administrative staff was found to be eating into clubs’ operating margins by the report.
They increased across Europe by 19 per cent in 2023, with double-digit wage growth reported in 16 of the 20 leagues examined in the report.
UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin said in the foreword to the report: “While most clubs appear to be managing player wage increases responsibly, other costs are rising rapidly, putting greater pressure on operating margins than ever before.
“The clubs must remain vigilant as considerable work still needs to be done to restore pre-pandemic profitability.”
Investment in stadiums across all clubs reached a record high in 2023 to 2.1bn euros (£1.8bn), exceeding the previous record of 1.5 bn euros set in the pre-pandemic year of 2019, as clubs across Europe seek to maximise matchday revenue.
Four clubs invested more than 100m euros during 2023 (Real Madrid, Barcelona, Everton and Paris St Germain) but there was also an increase in the volume of investments with 36 clubs investing at least 10m euros, compared to 18 clubs the previous year.
The report found these long-term investments appear to have continued into the 2024 season, with record investment levels among early-reporting clubs.
