After Des Buckingham’s Oxford United secured promotion to the EFL Championship at Wembley Stadium a few weeks ago, many questions have been raised as to whether or not the club has the financial backing to compete in the second tier.
Speaking to The Real EFL’s Jake Coburn this week, courtesy of Instant Casinos, football financial expert Dr. Dan Plumley, the Principal Lecturer in Sports Finance at Sheffield Hallam University, gave his views on how the U’s would fair financially in their first season back in the Championship in 25 years.
Firstly, Dr Plumley focused on the positive increase in revenue that the club will receive after gaining promotion, outlining the financial benefits of escaping League One.
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“They’ll earn about an extra £7 million in revenue, so the jump up is like £7 – 10 million, mostly linked to TV money and if you can stretch your matchday attendance and commercial deals a little bit further, then you can squeeze it a bit.
“Let’s say it’s at least £7 million for Oxford. Now their revenue in 2023 was £7.5 million. So you’re going to double your revenue if you’re Oxford which is really good. So that’s a big advantage for them.“
Oxford United will also be hoping to keep the key players that helped them get over the line to earn promotion in the first place such as the club’s Player of the Year Cameron Brannagan and clinical 15-goal forward Mark Harris.
Keeping key players will be pivotal if United are going to avoid relegation in 12 months’ time, as what Dr Plumley had to say about the financial gap between them and the rest of the teams in the division does not make for good reading for U’s supporters.
“The average revenue per Championship club is closer to £25 to 30 million every year, so there’s a big gap between Oxford doubling their revenue even to the average Championship club.
“Then, you’ve got some of those big clubs who have got parachute payments as well. The three relegated clubs from the Premier League will have just added a hundred million pounds in TV cash, and then £42 million each in a parachute payment for year one.
“So if you look at Sheffield United, Burnley and Luton, they’ve got almost six to seven times the amount of Oxford’s revenue in front of them before a ball’s been kicked.
“That makes it really difficult because you’ve got a decision to make there. You want to compete, but how much do you overstretch yourself trying to compete and for what gain?”
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So Dr Plumley believes that almost every team competing in next year’s Sky Bet Championship campaign will have, at the very least, over double the revenue and budget that the newcomers will have at their disposal.
Furthermore, with the three relegated Premier League clubs, Burnley, Luton Town and Sheffield United, they could have a minimum of six times more money to spend when compared to Oxford United – a number that really highlights the financial gap between clubs that will be competing in the same league next year.
Undoubtedly, Des Buckingham has a huge task on his hands to prevent relegation back to League One for Oxford United in what will also be his first time coaching in England’s second tier and it is critically important that they are able to make shrewd and clever signings ahead of the new campaign in an attempt to compete with the other teams in the league who, as Dr Plumley highlighted, will have significantly more funds to use when the transfer window opens in two weeks.
