ALLIANZ STADIUM, TORINO, ITALY – 2021/01/24: Cristiano Ronaldo of Juventus Fc will be watching during … [+]
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Three Italian sides – Juventus, FC Inter, and SSC Napoli – were featured in the top 20 revenue-generating football clubs in Deloitte Football Money League 2021 report published last week, along with seven English, four Germans, three Spanish, two French, and one Russian club.
The annual ranking, now in its 24th edition, analyzes the turn of the biggest football clubs in the world and is the first to return a panoramic picture of a season hit by a pandemic COVID-19 -confident.
In the 2019/2020 season, the top 20 clubs generated $ 9.39 billion combined in 2019/20, down 12% on the previous season ($ 11.2 billion).
The COVID-19 induced loss affected almost all well-known revenue sources for football clubs, such as matchday, commercial revenue, broadcasting rights and “the lost ability to continue on its previous growth path over time ”, the report observes.
Unfortunately, Serie A was no exception: Italy’s top football league clubs recorded a total revenue reduction of $ 201 million, amounting to a fall of $ 67 million per club to average.
In addition, Deloitte identified a critical situation in terms of broadcasting rights revenue in Italy, where “UEFA League rights have fallen by 20% ($ 67 million) per quarter”.
The loss also affected home rights. Italian rights broadcaster Sky Italia has reportedly claimed a payout of around $ 158 million, “after claiming a 15-18% reduction due to the delayed season”, the analyst said. follow up.
Despite the hardships, the Serie A champions Juventus are once again the richest club in Italy, maintaining the 10th position achieved last year.
The team with Italian family Agnelli recorded total revenues of $ 482 million, a drop of $ 75 million compared to last year’s turnover.
The report monitors how the decline in mother-day income (-36%) leads to the largest percentage decline of all clubs in the ranking.
However, the Old Lady recorded a profit when it comes to commercial revenue, which saw a small increase of $ 4 million.
The sponsorship agreement signed with Jeep amounted to $ 55 million per quarter, along with the extension of the club’s technical sponsorship arrangements with Adidas until at 2026/27 the negative trend was reversed.
MILAN, ITALY – JANUARY 26: Internazionale players celebrate as a group following the final whistle … [+]
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It is the second Italian club in the FC Inter ranking, owned by Suning Holdings, China’s largest appliance retailer and e-commerce company.
The Nerazzurri ranked 14th with total earnings of $ 353 million, maintaining the same position in the previous year despite a sharp decline in revenue.
Antonio Conte’s side suffered a fall of $ 88 million – the biggest year-on-year decline among Italian sides – as a result of the club’s “revenue spread for the 2019/20 season over two years finance ”, that is the end of 2020 / present Season 2021.
The same was also shared with SSC Napoli. The team, owned by Italian film tycoon Aurelio De Laurentiis, is the third Italian club in the top 20.
The Partenopei saw revenue drop $ 38 million, with broadcast revenue (the club’s largest source of revenue) falling 12% as a result of finishing in seventh place, the position lowest finish since the 2008/2009 season.
Bad news for AS Roma too, like the Giallorossi have dropped out of the top 30 after finishing 16th in the previous edition, largely due to a failure in the Champions League.
Last but not least, AC Milan fell to an all-time low (30th) as the club banned UEFA club competitions.
A critical financial situation that is unlikely to be over any time soon.
“We estimate that this year’s Money League clubs will have lost more than € 2 billion in revenue by the end of the 2020/21 season – as a result of the COVID outbreak. -19 ”, the report states.
The only hope for Italian football lies in a consortium of private equity firms led by CVC Capital Partners.
Last October, the company entered into blocked talks to buy a 10% stake in newco regulating $ 1.88 billion worth of Serie A media rights, which could shake the country’s football industry .