The Golden Game

BT paid £900 million for the Champions League TV rights. "The BT deal means that Britain now spends about £44 per person on live sports rights," says Birch, who is currently the joint administrator at bankrupt Scottish Premiership club Hearts. "The difference between finishing fourth and fifth is profound. Americans would call it 'the cliff'. You miss out on £20-30m from Uefa, but it also affects match-day and commercial revenues. And the effect is cumulative and logarithmic - it gets more difficult each year. It's pure maths. If you finish fifth in the Financial Fair Play era you cannot close the revenue gap. Come fourth and you're fine. You can put £15m on the wage bill - that's three superstars."

The best predictor of football success is the size of a club’s wage bill. Uefa acknowledges that there is a "close link between sporting success and financial buying power" but denies that its TV deals and Financial Fair Play initiative will make football less competitive.  Deloitte's Austin Houlihan estimates England's four Champions League clubs can expect an extra £10m at least from 2015-16, and leading sports lawyer Daniel Geey believes a Premier League team that goes on to win the Champions League could earn as much as £75m from Uefa's prize money pot and "TV pool".

  Ten seasons ago,  Porto beat Monaco 3-0 to win the Champions League. That victory represents the last time a team outside Europe's financial elite won the competition, and just like the only other relative minnow to achieve that feat in the past 20 years - Ajax in 1995 - the side was immediately disbanded, picked apart by richer rivals. One year later the only Champions League winner still at the club was the goalkeeper Vitor Baia. Not even the manager Jose Mourinho remained. Another talented young coach, Andre Villas-Boas, would inspire Porto to Europa League success in 2011, but the stars of that team were soon sold on as well. Trapped in a small-market league, with limited global appeal, Porto are condemned to be a selling club. Less wealthy teams can rarely maintain success or sustain challenges for long: the market adjusts, good players move.

In the 21 years of Premier League football, Blackburn Rovers are the only team currently outside the financial elite to have won it, and they were in the money then. Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester City and Manchester United have shared the other titles. In the 21 years of Division One football preceding 1992, seven teams won the league, including Derby County, Leeds United and Nottingham Forest. In the 21 years before that, 11 teams won the title, with Burnley, Ipswich Town, Spurs and Wolves all finishing first.

"The fundamental effect of the BT deal will be additional wealth for England's big three - Manchester City, Chelsea and Manchester United - and probably the next three too, Arsenal, Liverpool and Spurs," says Liverpool's former managing director Christian Purslow. "You will now have six teams playing for four Champions League places, with the other 14 teams playing for survival. Never again will the likes of Everton, Newcastle or Villa get near the top - the difference in revenues will just be too great."

Taken from here