By

Iain Rogers




PUBLISHED:


23:21, 5 September 2013




|



UPDATED:


00:01, 6 September 2013


La Liga clubs earned more from player sales in the close season than any league in history, including a record amount from selling talent to rivals abroad, according to a study published on Thursday.


The figures compiled by Barcelona-based Prime Time Sport underlined how Spanish top-flight teams, excluding wealthy Real Madrid and Barcelona, are increasingly being forced to cash in on top performers to stay afloat.


They also suggested UEFA’s Financial Fair Play (FFP) rules, currently being phased in and designed to prevent clubs spending more than they earn, are beginning to bite.


Big-money exit: Mesut Ozil left Real Madrid for Arsenal for £42.5m

Big-money exit: Mesut Ozil left Real Madrid for Arsenal for £42.5m



La Liga clubs sold players worth £404

million in the transfer window which closed on Monday,

Prime Time’s latest Football Transfer Review showed.


Almost a third of income, or £117m, came from deals with clubs outside Spain.


The

majority of players were sold to English Premier League sides,

including Mesut Ozil leaving Real Madrid for Arsenal, Alvaro Negredo and

Jesus Navas joining Manchester City from Sevilla and Roberto Soldado

switching to Tottenham Hotspur from Valencia, though Real also bought domestically in the likes of Isco.


La Liga clubs spent £337m buying players, the second highest amount ever, yielding a

net profit of around £67m, with Real (£154m) and Barca (£48m) accounting for 62 percent of the outlay.



Jesus Navas

Roberto Soldado

Departed: Jesus Navas and Roberto Soldado (right) left La Liga for the lure of the Premier League



Outside the big

two, the world’s richest clubs by income, four clubs did not spend

anything at all on players and nine laid out less than £2.52m each.


‘La

Liga is now more of a seller than a buyer and except for Real and Barca

is experiencing difficulties in holding on to talent,’ Prime Time said.


‘As many as 13 of the 20 teams in La Liga took their chance to cash in and clean up their accounts.’



Domestic mover: Isco was among the most expensive players to move within La Liga when he joined Real Madrid from Malaga

Domestic mover: Isco was among the most expensive players to move within La Liga when he joined Real Madrid from Malaga




The

study also showed that after Real’s purchase of Gareth Bale from Spurs

for a record £86m, the club has spent 611 million on players in

the past five years, almost 40 percent of the total for La Liga.


They

have spent 75 percent more than arch-rivals Barca (£293million), who

bought only one player in the close season – Brazil forward Neymar from

Santos for £48m – for the first time in a quarter of a century.


Barca

have the joint-most players from their own academy with 17, the same as

Athletic Bilbao who only field players of Basque origin, Prime Time

said.




















The comments below have not been moderated.






All clubs in Spain are skint, except Barcelona and Real Madrid who are both up to their eyeballs in debt. One sponsored by the Spanish government and the other by local Catalan government. How long before the people say “enough is enough” and they have to withdraw their support, what then? Spanish teams have lived way beyond their means for far too long.



Scotchy of Eggdom

,


London, United Kingdom,

06/9/2013 08:39


Report abuse




scotchy of eggdom


why are you lying? you dont have any friends



ben

,


London,

06/9/2013 08:32


Report abuse




Spoke with a Valencia supporting friend of mine and he couldn’t believe Sp*rs actually paid £26 million for Soldado who has only ever had ONE 20 goal league season, is 4th choice for Spain (they often prefer to play no striker at all or even Torres ahead of him!) and has absolutely no re-sale value because of his age. I think Baldini may well turn out to be the next Commoli, you never know.



Scotchy of Eggdom

,


London, United Kingdom,

06/9/2013 08:15


Report abuse




The big clubs as I have said before will still be the winners of the supposed fair play system. For me it is a con as if you look at it you will see the bigger the club the more clout they will have compared to smaller clubs thus making it harder for smaller clubs to compete,so harder to get to the top. Nothing tells you this more than Spanish football. The only hope smaller clubs (or clubs badly run over decades but potentially big) had was if a sugar daddy came along but even that is being taken away from them. No this knew fair play is for me totally UNFAIR.



Name

,


Town o Country, Heard Island And McDonald Islands,

06/9/2013 08:00


Report abuse




and how much spent? £86m Bale/£50m Neymar/£30m Illaramendi/£22m Isco, which means that almost £200m of this “net income” has been spent, and all the players have gone to one of the big two, whereas most of the talent leaving la liga has gone from the rest of the division, and people wonder why la liga is not considered a strong overall league? The rest get talent drained whilst the rich get richer. Sad state.



The Speaker of Truth

,


North London, United Kingdom,

06/9/2013 04:38


Report abuse




The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline.