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The world’s most valuable football club resides at the Catalan stadium Camp Nou. For the first time ever, FC Barcelona has topped the prestigious ranking by Forbes magazine, with a total valuation of $4.76 billion.
They have nearly every major trophy in their cabinet—but this title had eluded them until now. The winner of the Forbes ranking titled The Most Valuable Soccer Teams is, for the first time, the team built around the iconic Lionel Messi. The total valuation of the "Blaugrana" was set by the compilers of the list at $4.76 billion. In a close second came their eternal rival, Real Madrid, with a valuation of $4.75 billion.
A comparison with two years ago—when Forbes last compiled this list—is especially interesting. Despite the coronavirus pandemic, the average club valuation among the top 20 has risen significantly. Today’s average is $2.28 billion, representing a 30 percent increase compared to the 2019 edition. “Football, or rather the football industry as a whole, is a huge phenomenon and it has value. But it’ll be interesting to see the next ranking in two years, when the full impact of the pandemic will be reflected in the data. It’s likely we won’t see such sharp growth then,” sports analyst Jozef Tokos told Economic Daily. This is also backed by data across the wider sports spectrum. Barcelona is now the fourth most valuable sports entity in the world, while Real Madrid is fifth. However, one trend that is already clearly visible is a decline in revenues. Unlike overall valuations, revenues have tended to decrease over the two-year period. “The clubs’ struggles are far from over. A significant factor is the sharp drop in match-day revenues, as most leagues this season are allowing either very limited or no spectators at all,” writes Forbes journalist Mike Ozanian in the article. The current situation is hitting hardest those clubs in Europe that have long had high attendance figures. For teams like Borussia Dortmund or Schalke 04 Gelsenkirchen, gate receipts are a vital economic lifeline that is continuing to dry up.
Barcelona, the top-ranked club, generated revenues of $792 million and posted a relatively solid operating profit of $62.2 million. However, seven clubs from the elite top 20 recorded operating losses. AS Roma posted the worst figure with a loss of $108.4 million, while things weren’t much better at AC Milan, which reported a negative result of over $92 million. Across the two-year monitoring period, the worst numbers were seen in the operating profit/loss indicator, where clubs on average saw a drastic 70 percent drop in money earned.
According to Tokos, professional football will spend the next few years recovering from the pandemic’s effects. He believes clubs have already signaled this trend during the most recent transfer window. “We’ve seen a noticeable increase in loan deals and a drop in transfers valued between €10 and €25 million. This was especially evident among Premier League clubs, and in many cases involved players whose value was simply overstated,” Tokos noted, while adding that from a medium- to long-term perspective, he is not concerned about the future of the world’s most popular game.
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