Covid pandemic costs Premier League £2bn in revenue

Premier League CEO Richard Masters has laid bare the extent of the financial damage the pandemic had inflicted on the competition and its clubs.

The coronavirus pandemic will have cost the Premier League close to £2bn (€2.3bn) by the end of the season, its chief executive Richard Masters has said, but he hopes to start next season with full stadia.

Saturday marks a year since the suspension of the English professional game because of the Covid-19 outbreak, leaving the league open to demands for rebates from broadcasters and its clubs unable to welcome spectators to any meaningful level since.

And Masters laid bare the extent of the financial damage the pandemic had inflicted on the competition and its clubs.

“There have been very significant financial losses, not just in the Premier League but throughout the football pyramid,” he said.

“Towards the end of this season, we’ll get towards £2bn (€2.3bn) lost since the start of the pandemic in match day revenue and broadcast revenue.”

Masters has great optimism for the future, however, and believes there is a chance of full stadia for the start of the 2021-22 season.

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“A lot of things have got to happen at the right time to get there, but we believe it’s an achievable goal,” he said.

Masters confirmed that the league hoped to be able to play the final two rounds of the current season in front of up to 10,000 spectators under the British government’s road map for the easing of coronavirus restrictions, and said the continued success of the UK vaccination programme was key to venues returning to full capacity in the future