At the beginning of this season’s Premier League campaign, Southampton FC looked like anything but a front-runner. Having lost a troika of quality players to Liverpool—Adam Lallana, Dejan Lovren, and Rickie Lambert—Calum Chambers to Arsenal, and Luke Shaw to Manchester United, the Saints’ core had departed, and prospects for a second strong campaign were given long odds in Vegas.
But by the end of November, Southampton was far from a relegation battle: with 26 points, the Saints were in third place, just one point off of Manchester City in second, and even with a slim goal differential advantage over City. Having lost no less than half a compliment of outfield players to ‘bigger clubs’ in the offseason, Southampton’s league place was certainly laudatory. But if, rather than looking back six months to the season’s onset, we look back six years, the achievements at St. Mary’s Stadium look even more impressive.
In 2009, Southampton was in truly dire straits; their holding company was going into administration with debts in excess of £27 million, and the situation was bad enough that club administrator Mark Fry admitted that, at Southampton, “the future of the club is in serious jeopardy.” The dissolution of a team you support seems unthinkable, impossible, but in the twenty-first century, all English football clubs are businesses with international aspirations—and businesses that aim high, don’t always land softly.
Flash forward to 2015, and you will see a phoenix amid those ashes. Southampton is not only in England’s top flight, not only competing within that league for European Cup spots, but they’ve even turned their club around financially. Earlier this week, BBC ran the headline “Southampton makes £33m profit thanks to record TV deal.” This headline is accurate, if somewhat unfair to the club. While the boatload of TV cash from 2013-2014 certainly bolstered the Saints finances, and while the increase in TV revenue from 2012-2013 was roughly the same as the increase in Southampton’s profitability, the clubs’ savvy is irreducible to simply cashing in on the TV windfall.
For one thing, although the astronomical numbers may be reminiscent of a high stakes Power Ball ticket, the TV revenue earned by Southampton is not at all like winning the lottery. As with this season’s ludicrously lucrative television deal, these numbers are hammered out ahead of time, for future seasons, and can thus be planned for in a team’s operating budget. Even if Southampton’s profitability seems perfectly in line with the £34m increase in TV revenue, that increase was planned for—and necessary, considering that the Saints are still roughly £50m in debt. But just ask Amazon (or, um, Manchester United for that matter): debt does not mean a business is failing, and planning future profitability to act as a counterbalance to currently residing in the red is in fact a sign of savvy management.
But there’s another sign of savvy management that supporters will be even happier about: not jumping the shark to pay off the loans. Despite selling five of their most highly celebrated players from the 2013-2014 season, Southampton’s reported revenue of £33m doesn’t have so much as a tuppence from player sales. The team’s chief financial officer, David Bence, affirmed that “The profit from player trading has all been reinvested in transfer fees, player wages and additional football-related costs, in order to support the aspirations of the 2014/15 season.”
And it shows.
Currently, the Saints sit sixth in the league, not nearly as high as their November perch, sure, but not out of the running for a Europa League, or even a Champion’s League place. Southampton is a mere point behind Liverpool in 5th, 53 to 54, with a much better goal differential, 21 to Liverpool’s 12. Although catching Manchester United for fourth—and beating out Liverpool en route to doing so—is a tall order, it’s far from impossible. Southampton are 6 points behind Man United’s 59, but with eight games left to play, and thus a full 24 points on offer, 6 is certainly not an insurmountable gap. Additionally, the Saints have only one match left against a top four team, Manchester City on the last match day, while Man U have to face Chelsea, City, and Arsenal.
Against the likes of Liverpool and Manchester United, the Saints are a definitive underdog. If Southampton is gunning to qualify for Europe, they have a hard road ahead, to be sure, but they are well equipped for the journey. Further, in the grander scheme of things, their surefire place above the bottom of the table is an achievement in itself—and a lucrative one. With the further boost to TV revenue for EPL clubs on the horizon, the club can put their lower-division administration days even farther behind them.
During the month of March, Southampton won two of their three EPL matches, and drew the third, away at Stamford Bridge. Should the Saints continue that form through the final two months of the season, they will certainly be in Champion’s League contention. But imagine yourself six years ago, in April, telling the fans of a club in administration, that phrase: your club will be, in six years, “in Champion’s League contention.” Regardless of whether the Saints beat out Liverpool, Arsenal, and Man U for fourth place this season, this much is clear: jeopardy is a thing of the past; the future is bright.