The English Premier League has shot past Germany’s Bundesliga to the top of European football shirt sponsor income, which has also recorded a big overall rise in the six top leagues.
The 20 Premier League clubs receive 128 million euros (176.5 million dollars) from their sponsors this season, up a staggering 44.5 million euros from 83.5 million euros 12 months ago, the Sport+Markt consultancy said in its 2010/11 European Jersey Report.
Germany’s 18 Bundesliga clubs get 9.9 million euros more this season from their sponsors for a total 118.5 million euros. Italy’s Serie A is a distant third on 65.9 million euros (down 8.2 million), with France (58.7), Spain (57.5) and Netherlands (42) completing the field.
According to Sport+Markt, overall shirt sponsor income rose by 75.2 million euros from 395.5 million to 470.7 million euros. Ten years ago the six leagues generated only 234.6 million euros from shirt sponsors.
England also boasts the clubs with the best individual deals. Manchester United and Liverpool receive 23.6 million euros each from finance giants AON and Standard Chartered Bank, respectively, to lead the way from Real Madrid (Bwin, 23 million) and Bayern Munich (Deutsche Telekom, 22 million).
This fits a trend as the financial sector dominates shirt sponsoring with 112.5 million euros, up 37 million euros in 12 months.
“The financial sector has never been as strong as now in football sponsoring,” said Sport&Markt executive Hartmut Zastrow.
Sports betting companies have also raised their investment, by 40 per cent to 78.9 million euros. The figure could be even higher if Germany did not impose an advertising ban for betting companies.
But the Bundesliga retained first place in average club income from shirt sponsors at 6.6 million euros, just ahead of the Premier League (6.4 million). “Shirt sponsoring is a success story in Germany. Club shirts are a premium form of communication for companies,” said Zastrow.
