NEUCHATEL: Real Madrid may not lead the league in Spain but they top an international squad transfer value table according to the latest survey by the Swiss-based CIES Football Observatory writes KEIR RADNEDGE.

Madrid were also placed top of the ‘turnover league’ last week in the annual club wealth review from Deloitte.

However heavy expenditure is no guarantee of trophies since both world and European champions Bayern Munich and Spanish title-holders and leaders Barcelona feature in the bottom half of the transfer top 10.

Madrid’s current squad cost a transfer fee total of €536m, ahead of three clubs from the English Premier League in Manchester City (€435.1m), champions Manchester United (€394.9m) and Chelsea (€376m).

The United figure may come as a surprise to English fans because of a perception that the owning Glazer family have been comparatively parsimonious by comparison with some of their Premier rivals.

French champions Paris Saint-Germain, popularly considered to the most profligate spenders in Europe, come ‘only’ fifth.

However their total squad transfer value of €365.9 is likely to be increased – and lift them above Chelsea – before the end of the week if they sign Yohan Cabaye from Newcastle for €27m.

The top 10 is completed by Tottenham Hotspur (€250.1m), Barcelona (€237.3m), Bayern Munich (€233.1m), Arsenal (€215.7m), Juventus (€213.8m).

The other two clubs in the €200m-plus category are Liverpool (€212.6m) and controlled Monaco (€204.9m).

The CIES (Centre International d’Etude du Sport) Football Observatory was set up in 2005 by Raffaele Poli and Loïc Ravenel as the Professional Football Players Observatory. Since 2011, it is one of the cornerstones of the vast CIES Observatory project, dedicated to the statistical analysis of sport.

Observatory researchers specialise in the demographic study of football’s  labour market, performance analysis at team and player levels as well as in the predictive models to determine the outcome of competitions.

More information: http://www.football-observatory.com/?lang=en

 

###############