The revenues from the Champions League, including participation prizes, television rights and bonuses, have become of crucial importance in the international football scene. For many teams, qualification for the top European competition represents a real seasonal crossroads for planning the future and building a team capable of remaining competitive over the years. Specifically, in Italy, this year the historic possibility of bringing 6 teams to the Champions League is still alive thanks to the seasonal coefficient and Atalanta’s victory in the Europa League. Of course, to make this happen Atalanta needs to maintain fifth position and not go further and if this were to happen Roma would go to the Champions League. It then goes without saying what would happen in terms of the distribution of TV rights, and how much Roma’s qualification could disturb the 5 already qualified teams.
New Champions, new rules
The total prize money of the new Champions League will be 2.437 billion euros: 27.5% of the spoils will be allocated to the starting fees, with each club receiving 18.62 million euros. 37.5% will be allocated to prizes for the results obtained in the competition and the remaining 35% will form the “value”, a new pillar that encompasses and combines historical ranking and market pool. This value plays an important role in the distribution of television rights. Until last year, with the classic market pool, each country was allocated a pre-established amount to be divided by the number of participants. In this context, having 4 teams or 6 to divide the cake would have made all the difference in the world but from next year, with value, this will no longer be the case.
How value works
The Value will be divided into two parts and the presence of more or fewer teams from the same country will not be relevant in the distribution of the money. The first is the part “non-European”, which will be distributed to clubs based on their historical/ten-year ranking. The second, called “European”, will take into account the average of two different rankings – both of 36 teams, given that there are 36 participants -: one will depend on the television market value of the country, the other on the UEFA ranking of the teams of the last 5 years . For clarity, let’s give an example: If Italy were the first television market, the 5 already qualified Italians would be classified from first to fifth position on the basis of a calculation that takes into account their participation in the groups in the UEFA competitions of the previous 5 seasons. If Germany were the second largest television market, the 5 German qualifiers would be ranked from sixth to tenth according to the same criterion and so on, until there were a ranking of 36 teams. On the other hand we would have another ranking, again with 36 teams, positioned as we were saying by UEFA ranking. The “European value” will now draw up the final ranking by averaging the positions in the two rankings, so if a team is first in one and third in the other it will have an average of two points in the general ranking. Clearly, the lower the average that comes out of these two rankings the higher the position in the final ranking. Whether there are 2,3,4,5 or 6 Italians therefore has no relevance in the distribution of the rights of the Italians themselves. This dynamic means that even if Roma were to finish above Atalanta in these rankings they would earn around a million more, therefore nothing transcendental. In summary, the possible presence of Roma would not have an impact as they are more Italian because the dynamics of dividing the cake between compatriots no longer exists. Furthermore, the entire Italian football system could have advantages in having the sixth Italian team in the Champions League considering that it would help – competitors in the Champions League place included – to have the fifth slot again next year.
The television rights of the Lega Serie A
As regards the division of the television rights of the new Champions League, therefore, at most a million could dance which, we repeat, does not depend on the presence of an Italian player in the Champions League or not. It remains anyway the issue of placing in the championship must also be considered. The Lega Serie A offers a cash prize to all the teams in the championship in relation to their position, increasing the prize by two million when they move up in position. In fact, if Atalanta were to finish third from fifth place, they would earn 4 million more having jumped two positions in the standings.
