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Deloitte explain why Newcastle United missing from Deloitte Football Money League 2020 rich list

4 years ago
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Tuesday morning saw the Deloitte Football Money League 2020 report published.

The Deloitte Football Money League is a ranking of football clubs by revenue generated from football operations.

It is produced annually by the accountancy firm Deloitte and released early each year, with figures from the season most recently finished.

The main focus in the report is on the top 20 revenue generating club, with a breakdown and detailed analysis on each of those twenty clubs.

In addition, those clubs in positions 21-30 in terms of most revenue generated, are also listed. However, with no extra info or breakdown.

In the Deloitte 2019 report, covering the 2017/18 season, Newcastle United featured in the top 20. In 19th spot, NUFC were listed as generating 201.5m euros of revenue.

With no drive or ambition from Mike Ashley to make Newcastle United successful, it was always likely they would be overtaken by more ambitious clubs and fall out of the top 20. So when this Deloitte Football Money League 2020 report was released today, not the biggest surprise that Newcastle United weren’t in the top 20.

However, when then looking at positions 21-30 in this 2020 report (covering 2018/19 season) it WAS a major surprise to see Newcastle missing.

This was particularly so when Crystal Palace made it into position number 30 in the new report, appearing to show that NUFC revenues had dropped by over 25m euros in 2018/19 compared to 2017/18.

We do know the TV revenue figures for last season and Newcastle received almost £6m more than Crystal Palace, whilst we also knew that NUFC home crowds were more than twice as high as Palace’s last season with clearly matchday revenue far far higher for the Magpies (in 2017/18 it was £11m for Palace and £24m for NUFC). That leaves commercial revenue and in 2017/18, Newcastle’s was more than three times what Palace’s was, so even with Mike Ashley’s lack of ambition to make Newcastle successful on and off the pitch, clearly Crystal Palace haven’t suddenly overtaken NUFC in that respect either.

When noting Newcastle United’s absence from the Deloitte Football Money League 2020 report, we got in touch with Deloitte direct, with the people who prepared the report. Asking whether it was a mistake and Newcastle had simply been overlooked, or it was a case of NUFC had indeed seen falling revenues that took them outside the top 30 and below Crystal Palace and others.

Deloitte replied to The Mag this Tuesday afternoon and explained that the Newcastle United absence wasn’t due to either of these potential explanations.

Instead, Newcastle United hadn’t supplied the figures when asked.

Whilst some clubs publish their accounts for the previous season ahead of the yearly Deloitte report, many clubs don’t, including Newcastle United. For those clubs, Deloitte request the figures ahead of the accounts being published and obviously clubs, including Newcastle, are usually happy to do so.

However, this time, for whatever reason, Mike Ashley and Newcastle United have decided not to supply the information to Deloitte.

Deloitte say that when/if Newcastle United do supply the figures, or once the accounts are published, then any future reporting from them (Deloitte) will take into account the NUFC revenue figures.

However, until that happens they clearly aren’t willing to guess the Newcastle United revenues.

When Newcastle United finally make their 2018/19  revenue figures public, it will be interesting to see where that places them compared to the competition. Very likely somewhere in that 21-30 bracket.

Whilst they will surely easily surpass the 174.5m euros of Crystal Palace in 30th spot, it will be interesting to see where they are compared to two Premier League clubs who are showing ambition.

In the 2019 Deloitte report, Leicester were in 22nd spot with 179.4m euros for the 2017/18 season, in the new 2020 report they are still in 22nd but their total revenues have gone up to 200.0m euros for the 2018/19 season.

Meanwhile, Wolves of course were only promoted in 2018 and they have generated impressive 195.5m euros revenues in 2018/19 to put them 25th in this new 2020 report. Wolves finishing seventh last season after showing ambition on and off the pitch, also with plans to significantly expand the capacity of Molineux.

The Mag – Earlier today (Tuesday 14 January 2020):

The Deloitte Football Money League 2020 has just been published.

Tuesday (14 January 2020) seeing the football finance experts reveal which clubs in the World generate the most money.

The report covers the 2018/19 season, with Deloitte having access to the figures from every club, despite many clubs (including Newcastle United) not having published their accounts as yet for that campaign.

The big news at the top end of the Deloitte Football Money League 2020, is that Barcelona are now at the very top, taking a major leap forward to overtake Real Madrid.

Barca’s substantial jump on the previous year is put down to the club taking charge of its own merchandising and licensing activities.

Dan Jones of the Sports Business Group at Deloitte:

“Barca is a clear example of a club adapting to changing market conditions, reducing the reliance on broadcast revenue and focusing on growing revenues within its control.”

However, far bigger news, at least for Newcastle fans (and Mike Ashley…) is that Newcastle United (19th in the Deloitte 2019 report) have dropped out of the Top 20 clubs based on revenue.

The Deloitte Football Money League 2020 – Top 20 (totals in euros):

The really staggering news though, is that Newcastle United don’t even make the Top 30 revenue generating clubs in the Deloitte Football Money League 2020 rich list…(totals in euros):

With Mike Ashley showing zero ambition on and off the pitch in the way he runs the club, it was always very likely that Newcastle United would fall out of the top 20 this time. If you show zero ambition in trying to grow revenues and every club is doing their best to raise theirs, then it is all but inevitable that a number of other clubs will start to overtake you.

However, to fall totally out of the top 30 appears almost impossible.

The exchange rate hasn’t helped the clubs in England but can Newcastle United really have fallen below Crystal Palace?

In the Deloitte top 30 in 2019 (covering the 2017/18 season), Newcastle United were 19th with 201.5m euros, Crystal Palace 24th on 169.0m euros.

In this new 2020 top 30 (covering the 2018/19 season), Crystal Palace are 30th with 174.5m euros.

We don’t have a Deloitte figure for Newcastle United because they aren’t named in the top 30 but even with Mike Ashley in charge, can NUFC have really dropped more than 27m euros compared to the previous (2017/18) season.

Obviously looking ahead the warning signs are there for future revenues, when your owner has created a situation where he is handing out 10,000 free season tickets it tells you everything, whilst his Sports Direct empire continues to dominate St James Park and Newcastle United overall for a pittance paid by SD.

However, last season (2018/19), we do know that Newcastle United earned some £6m more than Crystal Palace from the TV deals, whilst on matchday revenues NUFC must surely also be way above Palace having had average home crowds more than twice as big last season (51,121 and 25,455).

We have emailed Deloitte’s UK Sports Team asking for clarification of Newcastle United’s absence from this 2020 report, is it an oversight or have NUFC really totally bombed out? We will update you when we hear anything.

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