Premier League clubs splash cash on imports with all-time high £445m in fees going overseas

It was a record-breaking transfer window fuelled by a record-breaking broadcast deal but there was concern on Monday night that nearly all of the £600 million-plus spent by Premier League clubs this summer had left English football altogether.

Import issue: more foreigners in the Premier League means fewer players for England manager Roy Hodgson to choose from Photo: GETTY IMAGES

Even before some of the late deals were concluded, figures produced by football finance experts Deloitte showed an all-time high £445 million in fees went overseas, with just £90 million changing hands between top-flight teams and their domestic rivals, an all-time low percentage of 16.8.

In the previous decade transfer fees had been spilt remarkably evenly between domestic and foreign clubs, with 2010 being the one anomaly when 26 per cent stayed in England on the back of the global recession that saw annual increases in ­spending briefly curtailed.

The reasons for this year’s dip are open to debate, according to experts, but one outcome is undeniably more foreigners in the Premier League and fewer players for England manager Roy Hodgson to choose from.

Hodgson has become embroiled in a war of words with Premier League chief executive Richard Scudamore over the talent pool available and on Monday found what would appear an unlikely ally in Scudamore’s precedessor, Rick Parry.

Scudamore recently argued that Hodgson should be able to find 11 players “to do well” for England but Parry said: “If there were 11 that were good enough to win the World Cup, we’d all be happy.”

The man who was also chief executive of Liverpool for more than a decade insisted the Premier League would not be as successful without foreign imports and that the fortunes of the England team were not its primary concern.

But he said: “Should it be a concern for the Football Association, in terms of the national teams — not just at the top level but I think also at the Under-21 level — then absolutely it should be.” On the foreign influx, he added: “Has the pendulum swung a little too far? Then I guess, objectively, you’d say it probably has.”

The other outcome of reduced spending domestically is almost certainly less money for Football League clubs. Parry said: “There has to be an element of concern from their point of view, particularly those clubs which exist to develop those players and sell them on.

"But, at the end of the day, the market will regulate the prices. They can still sell them but maybe they’ll just have to recognise that they’re in a highly competitive marketplace.”

Premier League clubs spent £80 million on Football League players in 2011, £60 million in 2012 and just £30 million this summer.

But Dan Jones, lead partner of the Sports Business Group at Deloitte, said: “Premier League clubs haven’t been buying that significantly from clubs outside the Premier League for a long, long time. I don’t think the change we’ve seen this summer jeopardises the rest of the pyramid.”

Rory Miller, who teaches Football Finance at Liverpool University, pointed out that Premier League clubs not spending domestically was not for the want of trying, following Chelsea’s doomed pursuit of Wayne Rooney and Arsenal’s failed bid to sign Luis Suárez.

“I think there is something there in terms of Premier League clubs being unwilling to sell to rivals,” he said.
“That may have something to do with the fact that, given the management changes that have taken place, the Premier League and Champions League places are probably seen as more open for 2013-14. Clubs are unwilling to gamble, if you like.”

Parry agreed, also highlighting that so-called smaller clubs were under less pressure to offload their top talent because their own coffers were boosted by the new £5.5 billion broadcast deal.

But he did acknowledge that there had long been a “perception” that English clubs did not offer the same value for money as their foreign rivals when it came to selling players.

“We’ve been heading in this direction since the Premier League started,” he said. “There’s nothing radically new in it. Whether it’s right or not in terms of the quality that’s come in is again a matter for serious debate.”