February 2 – LaLiga boss Javier Tebas (pictured) has again criticised the Premier League, saying the English top flight is “financially doped” after England’s top 20 clubs spent a combined record $1 billion in the recent transfer window, easily outspending Europe’s other big four leagues multiple times.
Last month, as he was on the offensive against plans for a European Super League plans, at the time calling the Premier League “the Super League” and based on this winter’s transfer spendings his words hold some truth, at least in a financial sense. Amid a global economic downturn, the English Premier League smashed the winter transfer window record as well as the overall season record, spending €3.15 billion on players.
“We read, the ‘strength’ of the Premier League, but it is a competition based on millionaire losses of the clubs, (their ordinary income is not enough for them) most of the clubs are ‘financially doped’,” wrote Tebas.
“In LaLiga what we are looking for is that clubs spend what they can generate autonomously. Shareholders are allowed to support within certain limits,” said La Liga’s Corporate Director Javier Gomez in a video Tebas had shared.
“In the Premier League it is the opposite. Until June 2021, the Premiership and the Championship had lost €3 billion ($3.28 billion), the Spanish LaLiga lost €250 million. In the same period, the Premier League and Championship shareholders put in €3.5 billion, in Spain they put in €450 million.
“They are doping the clubs, they are injecting money that is not generated by the clubs. This puts the viability of a club at risk when this shareholder leaves. In our opinion, this is cheating because it drags down the rest of the leagues.”
Last month Tebas called on European institutions to regulate the European sports model as a means to prevent Super League model from resurfacing time and again as treat to football on the continent. “Less declaration, more regulation,” said Tebas.
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