Cardiff, Fulham and Wolves lost ‘unsustainable’ £125m chasing Premiership dream

Cardiff, Fulham and Wolves lost almost £2.5million a week between them during their promotion campaigns last season, evidence of what financial analysis firm Vysyble believes is the Championship’s “wholly unsustainable” business model. Now that most clubs have published their 2017/18 accounts, Vysyble has updated its assessment of the cost of promotion to the Premier League and it has found a dramatic deterioration in the finances of all promoted clubs since 2015/16.

Unlike most football finance experts, Vysyble uses an “economic profit” model that also takes into account the cost of equity capital from club owners – in other words, the “opportunity cost” of not putting their money into a different investment.

Using this model, the three promoted clubs last season suffered economic losses of £125m, which brings the total loss for all promoted clubs over the last 10 seasons to £642m.

And these losses have accelerated over the last three years, with Newcastle losing £63m in 2016-17 – the biggest single economic loss – and Wolves losing £62m last year.

“This is a wholly unsustainable situation driven by the allure of the Premier League’s huge TV rights revenues,” the report said. “Championship clubs and their owners are clearly risking their financial sanity in pursuit of the Premier League’s golden ticket.”

● Bolton have been granted a further stay of execution by the High Court, while controversial former Watford chairman Laurence Bassini has been confirmed as the club’s prospective buyer.

The Sky Bet Championship outfit were back in court on Wednesday facing a windingup petition over an unpaid tax bill but the case has been adjourned until 8 May to allow the proposed sale of the club to proceed.