Everything to play for: how to earn a Ferrari in nine hours

NEWS

It’s no secret Premier League footballers are paid well for running around the pitch for 90 minutes each week. However, research released by UK car insurer Compare the Market puts into perspective the realworld value of their earnings.

Often valued at hundreds of thousands of pounds, the cost of a luxury or sports car can seem like spare change to the highestpaid players.

Compare The Market studied 64 top footballers to reveal who could afford to buy their car the quickest, looking at their earnings and the value of their most expensive car.

According to the study the average Premier League car costs £154,600 (R2.7m). On average, the majority of players can pay off the cost of their car within the space of one game. Compare this to paying off your VW Polo Vivo over 72 months.

At one end of the spectrum, Manchester City’s Bernardo Silva could pay for his modest Smart Fortwo in as little as six minutes of game time at a weekly wage of £120,000 (R2.1m). Big money doesn’t always mean big wheels.

FERRARI

At the other end of the scale, Tottenham Hotspur and South Korea striker Son Heung-Min bags the prize for the most expensive wheels in the Premier League, being the proud owner of a Ferrari LaFerrari worth £1.15m (R20m).

Despite this, it would still take just six games for Son to earn enough to pay for this supercar.

Among the Premier League’s top players, the study found those players who could pay off their car the quickest are:

Bernardo Silva (Manchester City), Smart Fortwo: five minutes’ match time

Alvaro Morata (Chelsea), Mercedes A-Class: 10 minutes’ match time

Nemanja Matic (Manchester United), Mini Cooper: 11 minutes’ match time

N’Golo Kante (Chelsea), Mini Cooper: 11 minutes’ match time

Ander Herrera (Manchester United), Mercedes A-Class: 14 minutes’ match time.

At the higher end of car values, those who need to play a little longer to pay off their car are:

Son Heung-Min (Spurs), Ferrari LaFerrari: 540 minutes’ (nine hours) match time

Dele Alli (Spurs), Bentley Continental GT Supersports: 239 minutes’ match time

Ederson Moraes (Manchester City), Ferrari FF: 233 minutes’ match time

Marko Arnautovic (West Ham), Ferrari F12 Berlinetta: 159 minutes’ match time

Danny Ings (Southampton), Mercedes AMG GT S: 157 minutes’ match time.

It took Son Heung-Min nine hours on the field to earn his R20m LaFerrari, above. Right: Bernardo Silva took all of five minutes to afford a Smart Fortwo.