In 2021 Chelsea and Manchester City contested the Uefa Champions League final, arguably the most prestigious competition in European football. Those clubs were also the two biggest loss-making entities in the Premier League, having lost about £1.6bn since former owner Roman Abramovich bought Chelsea in 2003.
These losses did not seem to be a concern for owners, players and supporters, and there were celebrations – albeit muted ones due to Covid-19 – when Chelsea won the Champions League trophy in 2021, followed by Manchester City two years later.
Out of control
The reason why Chelsea and Manchester City incurred such losses was a lack of cost control. In football, the two largest expense areas in a profit or loss account are wages (mainly those of players and coaches) and amortisation, which spreads the cost of a player’s transfer fee to a new club over the contract length.
We have seen the rise of a new middle ground in football: the data nerds
When Abramovich acquired Chelsea, wages plus amortisation as a proportion of total revenues went from 72% to 121% in a single year and pre-tax losses from £15m to £140m in two years.
Manchester City, meanwhile, were acquired by Sheikh Mansour in 2008 and took Chelsea’s biggest loss-making crown shortly thereafter with £197m, only to have Chelsea reclaim the title in 2025 with losses of £262m (and over £700m at group level). For those for whom financial prudence is a secondary concern compared to owning a trophy asset where the KPIs are measured in on-field success, these losses were seen simply as a cost of doing business.
At the other end of the financial scale, Tottenham Hotspur (Spurs) have been the most profitable club in Premier League history since the competition commenced in 1992. But Spurs fans are unhappy; their club finished 17th in the Premier League in 2024/25 and have had an equally uninspiring following season.
Is finding a sweet spot in football, where clubs can have a degree of success both on and off the pitch, an impossible dream?
Meet the data nerds
In recent years we have seen the rise of a new middle tier in football: the data nerds. These clubs accept that they cannot compete with the global brands such as Liverpool, Manchester United and City and the big London clubs, with their enormous fanbases and stadiums, so try to be smarter instead.
Crystal Palace won their first senior trophy in 2025 with the FA Cup, followed by a successful season in Europe. Brighton, which had twice been within one place of dropping out of the professional game when in the fourth tier of English football, finished sixth in 2023 and qualified for the Europa League for the first time in their history. Bournemouth and Brentford were in League Two as recently as 2009 but are now potentially competing in the Champions League after establishing themselves as hardy perennials in the top division.
There is an average revenue gap of over £300m between the ‘Big Six’ clubs and the nerds
Between them, these clubs (‘CBBB’ from now on) will have completed 40 seasons in the Premier League when it ends in May 2026. They have achieved this success without necessarily living beyond their means. Both Brighton and Brentford have made an overall pre-tax profit in their tenure in the Premier League, where the average pre-tax losses in 2024/25 were £40m – and that is after some beneficial related-party transactions.
Moneyball approach
Football clubs generate revenue from three main sources: matchday (ticket sales), broadcast (which favours the bigger brands as they generate higher viewing figures) and commercial (where global sponsors pay more for clubs with global followings). This means that there is an average revenue gap in the Premier League of over £300m between the ‘Big Six’ clubs and the nerds.
Where CBBB have excelled has been in another credit in the profit or loss account: player sale profits. These clubs have utilised a ‘moneyball’ approach, first identified by Oakland Athletics baseball team’s general manager Billy Beane. This involves ignoring some traditional metrics used to assess playing talent and instead using statistical analysis to assemble competitive teams on relatively low budgets.
A ‘moneyball’ approach involves ignoring some traditional metrics used to assess playing talent
Brighton’s owner Tony Bloom, through his companies Starlizard and Jamestown Analytics, and Brentford’s Matthew Benham, with SmartOdds, are both from a statistical and gambling background. Their use of data to initially give themselves an edge over traditional bookmakers helped them to have very successful careers, and they passed on some of this research-driven analysis to the teams they own (and both are lifelong supporters of their clubs) to identify players in markets that the traditional big clubs have tended to ignore.
For example, in 2021 Brighton purchased then unknown Moises Caicedo from Ecuadorian club Independiente del Valle for £4.5m, and sold him two years later to Chelsea for £115m. In 2020 Brentford bought Ivan Toney from lower league Peterborough for £5m and sold him as an England player to Al Ahli in Saudi Arabia for £40m in 2024.
Stepping stones
CBBB have established themselves as clubs who will not stand in a player’s way should he wish to move on his career to a more glamorous alternative, and this has helped them to be seen as stepping stones when a player is looking to advance their careers. CBBB deliver player sale profits that are multiples of the revenue generated from matchday, effectively giving themselves an additional income source that can be used to absorb costs.
The challenge for CBBB, and the other clubs that covet their approach to football recruitment, is whether or not they can maintain the current edge that they have in terms of player recruitment.
The bigger clubs now have similar recruitment philosophies and bigger budgets, but a lot depends on whether the elite will seek quick fixes to their on-field challenges or choose the development routes that the CBBB disruptors have proven to be successful.
