Thanks to the Premier League & Saudi Arabia: International spending record of 2019 broken

31 Aug 2023

The international spending record of all football clubs from the summer of 2019 was set at €7.568 billion. This benchmark is history three days before Deadline Day, and that even though La Liga and Serie A are now miles away from their transfer spending from the summer before the outbreak of Covid-19. The Premier League and Saudi Pro League are stepping into the breach to make up for it. In the night from August 29 to 30, transfer investments for 1,617 players reached €7.631bn.

In the 2019 summer transfer window, 1,969 players switched clubs for transfer fees and many leagues set new spending records that still stand today: La Liga invested €1.38bn, Serie A €1.23bn, the Bundesliga €762m and Ligue 1 €713m. At the time, the Premier League clubs paid €1.53bn for new signings – a few days before the end of the current transfer period, the world’s richest league already spent €2.43bn.

To take an accurate snapshot of the financial balance of power in football, it helps to look at the top 10 clubs most willing to invest: five play in the Premier League, three in Saudi Arabia plus Qatari-owned Paris Saint-Germain and Bayern Munich. In 2019, hardly any expert would have thought of soon finding Al-Hilal, Al-Ahli as well as Al-Nassr miles ahead of Barcelona and Juventus and just between Manchester City and Chelsea in the spending rankings.

Summer spending in 2023: Saudi Pro League surpasses La Liga and Serie A

While English clubs spend more year after year, also thanks to huge TV deals, many Italian clubs and virtually the entire La Liga are subject to cost-cutting constraints. Spanish first-division clubs, for example, spent a mere €398m on new players this summer – €1bn less than in 2019. Contrary to this trend, Saudi Arabia’s first division has established itself as a heavyweight in the transfer market, as money and financial fair play do not play a role in the Middle East. With currently €846m in transfer fees paid, the league, which is subsidised by the state, is positioning itself as a new authority thanks to a number of rich clubs and is partly responsible for pushing the worldwide spending into new dimensions.

When comparing the current differences between transfer spending and income, the financial strength of the Saudis becomes even clearer: the clubs from La Liga (+€125m), Serie A (+€182m), the Bundesliga (+€127m) and Ligue 1 (+€109m) have earned more on the transfer market than they have spent this summer. At the same time, the Saudi Pro League made a loss of €819m. It will not be certain how high the new spending record is on September 2, the day after Deadline Day in Europe’s top leagues, but rather on September 20 when the transfer window in Saudi Arabia finally closes.