The European cup tournaments, which always arouse great interest among football fans and gather full stands, are in full swing. Debutants, who changed teams and countries in the summer for a lot of money, are also making a difference to the leading clubs.
2.81 billion euros were spent by Ligue 1 clubs to buy players. The French Ligue 1 "lavished" 898.84 million, Italian Serie 1 - 856.3 million, German Bundesliga - 748.1 million, Spanish La Liga - 440.8 million.
Let's look at the spending of English clubs. Chelsea spent €462.1m on debutants, Tottenham €248.6m, Manchester City €241.1m, Arsenal €234.9m, Manchester United €206.7m and Liverpool €172m.
And here are the six clubs who made the most money on transfers: "Chelsea (€267m), Leipzig (€240.7m), PSG (€203m), Brighton (€190.2m), Southampton (€183.3m), Bayern Munich (€173.2m).
Here are five players whose legs cost too much for club owners. English midfielder Declan Rice moved from West Ham to Arsenal for €116.6m, while Ecuadorian Moises Caicedo swapped Brighton for Chelsea for €116m. Another English midfielder Jude Ballingham, who played for Borussia Dortmund, now plays for Real Madrid for 103 million. English striker Harry Kane moved from Tottenham to Bayern Munich for 100 million. Finally, Frenchman Randall Kolo Muani, who played for Eintracht Frankfurt am Main, is now defending the colours of PSG, who paid 95 million for him.
This is what today's big football is like. Money, money... And not only European. So, for example, the clubs of the Saudi Pro League to buy football stars did not spare 956.8 million euros. Brazilian Neymar moved from "PSG" to "Al-Hilal" for 90 million euros, Cristiano Ronaldo became a player of "Al-Nasr", and got his new club for free, as did not pay Real Madrid for Karim Benzema not a penny and "Al-Ittihad".
And lastly a few news of football behind the scenes.
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FIFA published a report on payments to clubs for the participation of their players at the World Cup 2022, which was held in Qatar and won by Argentina.
English Manchester City added $4.6 million to their budget, Barcelona $4.5 million, and Bayern $4.3 million. The three are followed by Real Madrid (3.83), PSG (3.8), Manchester United (3.32), Chelsea (3.25), Atletico (3.23), Juventus (3.04) and Tottenham (2.83). The total FIFA fund totalled $209 million. Notably, all clubs on the African continent received $0.3 million less than Manchester City alone.
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The match between American Inter Miami and Mexican Cruz Azul was watched by 12.5 million viewers. This is a record figure for broadcasting football matches in the United States. Such excitement was caused by the fact that the world champion Argentine Lionel Messi made his debut for Inter. The audience of the match, in which the representative of MLS won, exceeded the rating of the NBA finals (12.4 million).
However, these figures are considerably inferior to the TV broadcasts of the final matches of American football, the Super Bowl, which is very popular in the States.
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Luis Rubiales, president of the Spanish Football Federation, has resigned. The reason? The country's football community took great umbrage at the fact that he kissed Spain's World 2023 champion Jenny Hermoso on the lips. It happened during the awarding of the Spanish team after their victory over England in the World Cup final.
Hermoso, 33, claimed the kiss was non-consensual and sued Rubiales. That's a tough woman. And now it's unclear whether Rubiales will eventually return to his presidency of the football federation. As we see, kisses can be not only sweet, but also bitter ...
Oleksandr LIPENKO for Dynamo.kiev.ua