It's crazy, but some of the world's biggest clubs must maintain their competitive standard. In recent years it's become the trend to splash some unbelievable wages on players. With Real Madrid paying between Cristano Roland and Richardo Kaka, a sum of 45 million Euros per year; Manchester City paying between Sergio Aguero and Yaya Toure, 36 million Euros; and Lionel Messi alone, 33 million Euros per year. These clubs cannot but look for extra means to fund some of these crazy bills.
In a UEFA report published in 2011, it was estimated that about 50 percent of top European clubs were losing money and 20 percent were recording sizable deficits due to ever soaring expenditures. Many managers have gone dry of ideas on how to move their club forward as their financial books are always in red.
Barcelona was one of the first team to address balance sheet deficits when it allowed its first shirt sponsorship, by agreeing a 185 million dollars deal with the Qatar foundation in 2010. Today, most of the top clubs are devising new ways to make extra revenue to profitably run their operations. Lets look at what some of them are doing:
1. Sponsorship Deals: England's Abu Dhabi owned Manchester City signed a 628 million dollar sponsorship deal with the Emirate airline, Etlhad. And Real Madrid had earlier signed a 459 million dollar sponsorship deal with bwin, to help fund it's high yearly overhead.
2. Seeking Foreign Investors Partnership: Inter Milan owned by Italian oil tycoon, Massimo Moratti, is selling 67 million dollar stake in the club to a chinese investor. Former Italian Prime minister, Slivio Berlusoni, who owns AC Milan, is reportedly seeking investment from his friend at the Kremlin, Viadimir Putin also via Gazprom
3. Stock Exchange Operation: Manchester United is heading for a listing on the New York stock market - with IPO to raise 300 million dollars - to increase its capital outlay.
4. Investment Diversification: More recently European Champion, Chelsea, bankrolled since 2004 by Russian billionaire, Roman Abramovich, signed an investment deal for Chelsea to own some stake in energy giant Gazprom. And perhaps the most intriguing is that of Turkish club,Trabzonspor, which even gone down the surreal route of building a hydro electric plant, expected to yield a revenue of about 10 million dollars each year for the club.
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