FC Barcelona, the giant soccer club from Spain has reportedly earned a record revenue to the tune of $ 959.3 million in the 2018-19 season. As a result, it has become the biggest cash-generator in the history of football clubs across the world. People who are fond of betting on soccer matches also pump in a good amount of money into the games featuring FC Barcelona. The club is currently at the top of the La Liga table for 2019-20 season, having won 12 out of its 19 games, drawing 4 and losing only 3. Going by the odds, it’s a hot favourite to win the league this time.
Gap of $ 95 million between Barca and Real Madrid
Recently published Deloitte Money League 2020 ranked all the wealthiest football clubs of the world, factoring in their revenue figures for the 2018-19 season. The Catalan giants beat Real Madrid to the top spot, with the latter booking $ 864 million as revenues for the last season. The $ 95 million revenue gap between Barca and Real Madrid is the highest ever in the history of the ranking.
While on one side FC Barcelona’s revenue went up from $ 823 million in 2017-18, that of Real Madrid dropped from $ 896 million to $ 864 million. This boost in Barcelona’s earnings is also the first time that any football club has breached the $ 900 million mark.
Total $ 10.6 billion generated by the Top 20
The top 5 of the rankings were rounded out by Paris Saint-Germain, Bayern Munich and Manchester United. Combined together, these five richest clubs generated revenue exceeding that of 11 clubs from 10th to 20th place in the rankings.
The researchers revealed that the total revenue generated by 20 wealthiest football clubs of the world was $ 10.6 billion, the highest ever recorded by Deloitte Football Money League.
Broadcast continues to be the biggest revenue stream, contributing 44% of the revenue for these top 20. 40% revenue was generated through commercial deals, and the remaining 16% came from match days. Deloitte made a point that the top-ranked clubs showed far less reliance on the broadcasting revenues compared to the smaller teams.
The big revenue surge at FC Barcelona could be attributed to their overhauled operations, for instance, bringing the licensing and merchandising activities in-house. The commercial operations of the club alone generated a whopping $ 437.6 million last season, which was higher than the revenue made by the 12th ranked club in the current ranking.
As FC Barcelona is expected to further improve its commercial revenues going forward, experts are expecting it to retain the top position in the next edition of the ranking as well. Not just that, the club is well on its way to becoming the first-ever $ 1 billion club throughout the world.
Talking to CNBC, Alan Switzer, Deloitte Sports Business Group’s Director emphasised that the rich are getting even richer in the world of sport, more so in football.
