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Liverpool Echo
Liverpool Echo
Sport
Dave Powell

How much Liverpool are worth after huge FSG investment boost

Wins in both the Champions League and Premier League, a healthy balance sheet pre-pandemic, a squad full of stars and a global fan base makes Liverpool a valuable part of Fenway Sports Group's operations.

A recent Forbes valuation put Liverpool at 12th in the list of the world's most valuable sports teams, ahead of the other FSG-owned team, the Boston Red Sox baseball team, with the Reds having a value of of £2.93bn ($4.1bn), a rise of 165 per cent in the past five years.

When compared with their Premier League rivals from the 'big six', they are behind only Manchester United in terms of value, with United valued at £3bn ($4.2bn) according to Forbes, with the Old Trafford club's own growth over the same five-year period far slower at 27 per cent.

But how does that stack against the rest of the Premier League?

US sports business website Sportico conducted their own valuations of Premier League teams using similar metrics to that used by Forbes, assessing revenue streams and calculated using equity plus net debt.

Sportico's own valuation of the Reds closely aligned with what Forbes had published, having Liverpool at a £2.92bn valuation, with Manchester United's scaled up to £3.28bn.

The valuations of Liverpool, Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester City, Chelsea and Arsenal come to a total of £15.58bn ($22.05bn), a figure that dwarfs the combined value of the rest of the 14 Premier League clubs which stands, according to Sportico's valuations, at £2.61bn ($3.7bn).

That puts Liverpool's value at more than the rest of the 14 Premier League clubs outside the 'big six' combined, something that is also the case for both Manchester clubs.

The next club outside of the six most valuable clubs is Everton, their valuation of £371m ($525m) some £1.64bn behind Tottenham Hotspur, demonstrating the financial hold that the biggest clubs, who all were part of the failed European Super League plot to generate even more money, have over the rest of the league.

The big clubs have valuations more in line with what is seen in America in the NFL, NBA and MLB, where the financial security and certainty over cost base for franchises makes them far more valuable as opposed to clubs outside the big six who have risk attached to their competitions, whether that be the likelihood of missing out on Europe or the potential for losing Premier League status altogether, something that can be catastrophic for clubs.

Bridging the gap between the big six and the rest is a harder feat to achieve year after year.

Everton owner Farhad Moshiri's continued heavy spend and investment in the planned Bramley Moore Dock stadium development, as well as the heavy financial backing afforded to Aston Villa through Wes Edens and Nassef Sawiris point to those two clubs being the most likely, along with Leicester City (valued at £335.6m) being able to keep pace with what the biggest clubs can do financially.

Of course, it doesn't always translate into success on the pitch.

Arsenal's huge value (£2.16bn) certainly doesn't reflect on what they have achieved on the field in recent times, the club set to miss out yet again on European football next season owing to a lack of a football strategy and flawed transfer policy.

Spurs' new stadium drives up their valuation given how it impacts revenues, but they find themselves heavily in debt because of that and unable and unwilling to spend heavily in the transfer market.

Leicester remain the outlier in terms of success. A Premier League title and now an FA Cup, and also European football next season, albeit not in the Champions League, isn't reflected in its valuation, which sits behind Everton and West Ham United.

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