‘There is a ceiling for every club’ - The harsh reality of the Premier League
Why the fight to survive in the Premier League demands millions — and still offers no guarantees.
Figures marked with * are from Transfermarkt, converted from Euros to Pounds via XE.com, and adjusted for inflation using the Bank of England’s inflation calculator.
This season Southampton, Ipswich and Leicester spent a combined £314m on transfers to prepare for the Premier league. Yet, all three have had their fate prematurely sealed.
Often renowned as the most revered league in the world, only five of the 12 promoted sides have achieved survival over the last four Premier League seasons. Begging the question – is there an unfair hierarchy in English football?
If we look over into Spain’s La Liga, the spending habits are considerably less despite the league having a similar attraction to the Premier League.
Meanwhile in England, some teams throw a financial Hail Mary within their first season, hoping to boost their chances of survival. However, recently, clubs have adopted using data and ‘smart’ transfers to make a cost-efficient play to beat the drop.
The rewards of the Premier League
According to the 2024/25 Power Rankings of Sports data company, Opta, the Premier League is the highest-quality league in the world, with an average team rating of 87.9/100.
With elite quality comes elite rewards. During the 2023/24 season, Nottingham Forest earned £123.3m in broadcast revenue despite finishing 17th. This payment helped reimburse them on their £190m* transfer spree in the summer.
Football finance expert and senior lecturer at Sheffield Hallam University, Dan Plumley, emphasised just how important that injection of funds is for teams who have re-entered the league:
“You're talking about a revenue uplift of about £100 million minimum. So, if you've not been in that league for a while, you're £100 million away from some of those Premier League clubs to start with.”
Meanwhile in La Liga, the 17th placed team last year (Rayo Vallecano) only received €45.4m (£38.9m) from the broadcasting rights to the league. This gap in monetary rewards creates economic disparities between Spain and England, driving a significant fissure in transfer spending habits.
Premier League Heroes
From 2021 - 2024, the nine clubs promoted to the Premier League spent a combined £668m* on new transfers in their first season. That figure reflects the enormous financial pressure new sides face to strengthen their squads in a bid to survive and stay in line for the lucrative broadcast payments.
Football finance expert, Kieran Maguire, highlighted this pressure by saying:
“There's expectations from social media. There's expectation from fans. There's also expectations from the coach, because having pitted their own wits and their reputation, and getting the club promoted, they don't want to be given a squad that even Pep Guardiola would struggle to get a tune out of.”
Despite lofty expectations, promoted teams have managed to successfully meet them. During the 2022/23 season all three of Fulham, Bournemouth and Nottingham Forest stayed up, however, Fulham caught the most attention. Spending £72.8m*, the least of the three promoted clubs, Fulham experienced an impressive season, finishing in a very respectable 10th.
Star-signing Joao Palhinha, arriving for £23.8m*, provided defensive steel in midfield. However, it was the smart purchase of the energetic midfielder, Andreas Pereria, that bolstered Fulham’s survival hopes. Signing for just £9.1m*, he provided 10 goal contributions (goals + assists) across the campaign, costing £910,000* per-goal.
Five miles west, another London club experienced a cost-effective relegation escape a season prior. Surviving their debut Premier League season in 13th, Brentford spent just £39.9m* on transfers.
Brentford’s financially conscious approach proved to others that newly promoted teams could compete despite not having the same economic backing. Dan Plumley said:
“Other clubs will, and have, looked to follow the Brentford model. It gets spoken about as a really efficient use of data to drive recruitment. How do you compete against some of these other clubs when you can't compete with them financially? Brentford is an example of how you might do that.”
On the opening day of the season, Brentford shocked Arsenal with a 2-0 win, whilst towards the end of the campaign they hammered Chelsea with a 4-1 victory away from home.
Having joined Brentford whilst in the Championship, striker Ivan Toney lead the line with 12 goals. However, Yoanne Wissa was essential to Brentford’s counter-attacking style, operating as second-fiddle to Toney. At just £10.4m*, Wissa provided 8 goal contributions, resulting in a cost of £1.3m* per-goal. Given that goals famously win games, the cheaper they come the better.
Premier League Zeroes
There have been several clubs who struggled to find a foothold in the league despite extensive transfer spending. Last season, Burnley, Sheffield United and Luton all found themselves tumbling back down to the Championship.
Burnley returned to the Premier League after a dominant Championship season under Vincent Kompany, aiming to reinvent themselves with a more possession-based style - far removed from the gritty, resilient identity shaped under Sean Dyche.
Backed with £95m, largely spent on young, overseas talent, their transformation didn’t materialise. Burnley finished 19th, managing just five wins - equating to a cost of £19m per-victory. By contrast, fellow relegated side Luton spent £22.2m, with six wins costing them just £3.7m each.
Furthermore, Burnley’s marquee signing, Swiss forward Zeki Amdouni, failed to deliver. Signing for £15.9m, he only registered five goals and one assist - each goal involvement costing the club £2.6m.
Sheffield United experienced similar woes that same season as they placed bottom, with a swiss-cheese shaped defence which conceded 104 goals. They had previously experienced an iconic 2019/20 season, entering the Premier League and proving all the doubters wrong by rocketing up the league into 9th. Nevertheless, their £57.3m on transfers during 2023 couldn’t help them recreate history.
Dan Plumley highlighted football’s unpredictable nature:
‘There is no figure that you arrive at where if you spend X, you are guaranteed to get Y. It's just not that kind of industry.’
La Liga Comparison
Between 2021 - 2024, La Liga’s nine promoted clubs spent a combined £110.4m*. That’s £557.6m* less on transfers than their Premier League counterparts. Furthermore, only two of those promoted teams were relegated in the same season, compared to five in England
The success of La Liga’s stringent spending was clear in 2021/22, as Rayo Vallecano, Espanyol, and Mallorca all survived comfortably - finishing 12th, 14th, and 16th - after spending just £21.2m* combined. In contrast, Norwich, Watford, and Brentford spent £151.6m*, yet two of those Premier League clubs were relegated that same season.
Part of why Spanish clubs spend significantly less is due to the league's squad cost regulations, which dictate how much a team can spend on players and wages based on their revenue and historical performance.
“You can see it as a hindrance, but you can also see it as saving clubs from themselves, because they're not overstretching and really blowing themselves up financially.” - Dan Plumley
Furthermore, Kieran Maguire stresses that ownership funding in the Premier League is simply more abundant: “There are many wealthy owners of Premier League clubs who are willing to fund the transfer activity. This gives those clubs additional benefits, which you don't see in the smaller Spanish clubs.”
The Football Hierarchy
Premier League clubs outspend their La Liga counterparts not necessarily because of smarter recruitment, but because of the immense financial muscle granted by lucrative broadcasting deals and cash injections from owners. In contrast, La Liga’s squad cost regulations force clubs to operate within stricter financial boundaries, demanding efficiency over extravagance.
Yet, despite the Premier League’s wealth, its openness is illusory. Without meaningful regulation, the top-flight risks cementing a system in which the same teams rise while others inevitably fall short.
As football finance expert Dan Plumley states:
“There’s a bit of a hierarchy in English football, whether we want to accept that or not. And it does depend on the league, it depends on the club, it depends on the owners, it depends on regulation, but there is a ceiling for every club.”