Leeds: what has changed

The figures for later tests now count every sale in the right transfer window at ten more clubs, and every sentence that says when a sale leaves the average is now checked against the rule. No club's estimate for this season moves.

• The March 2028 test counts sales from 4 February 2025. The sales from then to each club's year end are now listed one by one at Arsenal, Brighton, Coventry, Crystal Palace, Fulham, Hull, Ipswich, Leeds, Manchester City and Sunderland.
• Brighton's figure for the March 2029 test, on frozen costs, is about 92%, from about 99%: its sales of February to June 2026 stay in the average for that test.
• Sunderland's sale-profit average at the March 2028 test is about £22.8m, from about £11m: Bellingham's and Watson's sales of June 2025 stay in for that test.
• Articles that said a whole financial year leaves the average are corrected, each with a note.

What moved: No ratio for the 2027 test moves. Brighton, March 2029 test: about 99% → about 92%. Sunderland, average at the March 2028 test: about £11m → about £22.8m.

Also moved:BrightonSunderlandIpswich TownHull City

We had averaged each club's profit on player sales over three financial years, but the rule averages the sales made in the six most recent transfer windows, which for the March 2027 test start in February 2024. Sales between February and June 2024 now count, among them several made before the June 2024 deadline of the previous rules, and ten estimates move: Chelsea's to 88.6%, from 92.5%, and Newcastle's to 81.3%, from 84.9%, the largest.

• The period the rule averages: the profit or loss on player sales over the six most recent transfer windows, divided by three, not over three financial years. For the March 2027 test the period starts on 2 February 2024, so sales from then until each club's 2024/25 year began now count.
• Brentford: David Raya's sale to Arsenal, which Brentford booked in June 2024, now counts, and Mark Flekken's sale to Bayer Leverkusen in June 2025 is no longer counted twice.
• Figures for later tests: where an article gives a club's figure for a later year, it is now worked out window by window; where we have not yet done that, the figure is withdrawn while we recheck it.

What moved: Chelsea 92.5% → 88.6%; Newcastle 84.9% → 81.3%; Aston Villa 77.4% → 74.4%; Nottingham Forest 99.3% → 97.6%; Brentford 83.8% → 82.3%; Everton 73.3% → 72.3%; Manchester City 73.8% → 73.1%; Tottenham 80.4% → 80.9%; Leeds 68.6% → 68.3%; Manchester United 56.9% → 56.8%

Also moved:ChelseaNewcastleAston VillaNottingham ForestBrentfordEvertonManchester CityTottenhamManchester United

Last season's commercial revenue is not in any club's filed accounts yet, so we estimate it. Until now each estimate was a judgement of ours. From this release every club's estimate is made by one published method, fitted on 81 filed year-on-year changes, with an assumption range sized from how far such forecasts have missed in the past. Seventeen estimates move. No club changes side of a threshold.

• The rule counts a club's commercial revenue for last season, 2025/26. Those accounts are filed between late 2026 and spring 2027, so for 19 clubs the figure is an estimate. We had built each one by hand, from the last filed figure and our own view of the club's season, and gave each a margin of 7% either way.
• The new method starts from the club's last filed commercial revenue and grows it by a rate that depends only on the size of that revenue: larger commercial businesses have grown more slowly in percentage terms. The rate is 19.3% for a club starting from £20m and 6.8% for one starting from £350m. It is fitted on 81 changes taken from filed accounts, every figure read on the page.
• We chose the method on one test only: how well it would have forecast commercial revenue in past seasons. It was compared with assuming no growth and with a rule that also used each club's own last change. We did not look at what any method did to a club's squad cost ratio, or at which side of 85% it left a club.
• The margin of 7% either way was too narrow. Past forecasts of this kind have missed by more, and by more for small clubs than for large ones. The new assumption range is sized from those misses and is wider on the upper side for smaller clubs. Most clubs' published ranges are wider as a result.
• Four clubs' assumption ranges now span the 85% line: Bournemouth (central figure 85.5%, range 79.5 to 87.8%), Brentford (83.8%, 79.5 to 87.5%), Newcastle (84.7%, 78.9 to 88.6%) and Tottenham (80.4%, 76.4 to 85.6%). For these the estimate does not reliably tell which side of the line the club is on.
• Sunderland and Ipswich Town changed division, where the size rule does not apply. Sunderland's estimate is the typical change of nine promoted clubs and Ipswich's the typical change of six relegated clubs. Both are provisional until their accounts are filed. Coventry City's and Hull City's ratios do not move: the rule counts its £15m minimum for both, and their own commercial revenue is below it. Our estimate of that revenue does change: it is now each club's last filed figure with no growth assumed, provisional until their accounts are filed.
• Manchester United does not move: its 2025/26 figure is filed. Leeds now has the cost of its merchandise taken off, as the rule requires and as at every other club; that cost is estimated, not filed.
• Two figures measured before player trading now sit a fraction of a percentage point from a line: Manchester City 84.9%, from 87.1%, which is 0.1 percentage points below 85%, and Chelsea 114.4%, from 115.5%, which is 0.6 percentage points below 115%. Both margins are smaller than the uncertainty in the commercial estimate, so the estimate does not reliably tell which side of either line the club is on before player trading. No published ratio changes side of a threshold.
• We have withdrawn our estimate of what the five-year amortisation cap would add at Chelsea if it reached the eight registrations signed before it. Two ways of calculating it give different answers, and we will publish neither until they are reconciled.
• From this release we write movements and margins of a ratio in percentage points and sporting deductions in league points, so the two are never confused.
• The forecasts of record are frozen and scored as frozen. The forecasts we published before this release stand in the track record as published and will be scored against the 2025/26 accounts as they were. The estimates of this release are held in its own timestamped record and will be compared with the accounts when they are filed.

What moved: Arsenal 59.5% → 59.9%; Bournemouth 85.5% → 85.5% (range 79.5 to 87.8%); Brentford 84.2% → 83.8%; Brighton 79.5% → 79.1%; Chelsea 93.2% → 92.5%; Everton 73.3% → 73.4%; Nottingham Forest 103.4% → 102.3%; Fulham 104.0% → 102.7%; Ipswich Town 95.8% → 97.1%; Leeds 67.4% → 68.6%; Liverpool 74.0% → 72.9%; Manchester City 75.4% → 73.8%; Newcastle 83.9% → 84.7%; Crystal Palace 78.9% → 78.1%; Sunderland 63.4% → 60.8%; Tottenham 82.3% → 80.4%; Aston Villa 76.0% → 77.4%

Also moved:ArsenalBournemouthBrentfordBrightonChelseaEvertonNottingham ForestFulhamIpswich TownLiverpoolManchester CityNewcastleCrystal PalaceSunderlandTottenhamAston Villa

We now measure every contract from the day a player was registered to the day the contract ends. A player who signs in August on a "five-year deal" has a contract of four years and ten months, because contracts end on 30 June. We had spread his cost over five full years, which made each year's charge a little too small. On that change every club's ratio rises, by 0.1 to 0.9 points. Five clubs also move because we now read the accounts of the group the rule describes, not the club company alone. No club's central figure crosses a threshold.

• The cost of signing a player is spread over the length of his contract. We had used the length as announced, in whole years. We now use the time between the registration date and the contract's end date.
• 504 contract lengths changed. For 190 of them a source states the end date. For the other 314 we have derived it as the 30 June that the announced length points to, which is when contracts in English football end, and we mark those dates as derived until we have a source for each.
• No length changed by as much as half a year. The effect is a few weeks per player, added up across each squad.
• Bournemouth's central figure moves from 85.2% to 85.5%, in an assumption range of 80.1% to 87.7%. The range still spans the 85% line, so the estimate does not tell which side of the line the club is on.
• Brentford (84.1%) and Tottenham (82.3%) move closer to the line. Neither is above it at the central figure.
• The same rule now applies to the contract a loan with an obligation to buy would create. One published figure moves on it, Fulham's, by 0.1 points.
• The rule tests a club together with its football companies. At Brighton and Sunderland the women's team is a separate company whose revenue the rule counts, so their ratios fall, by 0.3 and 0.2 points. At Ipswich the group's accounts remove a fee the club charges its own parent, so its commercial revenue is lower and its ratio rises by a further 0.9 points.
• Newcastle's group includes the women's team and a fan zone beside the stadium that opened in August 2024. We count the women's team's revenue in full and the fan zone at its profit, which lowers the ratio from 84.7% to 83.9%. This rests on our reading of the rule. The rule counts matchday food and drink in full, and if the League treats the fan zone that way the figure is lower, so the assumption range now runs from 80.7% to 86.0%.
• Manchester City's women's team sits in another company of the same group. We add its ticket and broadcasting income, which lowers the ratio by 0.3 points. We do not add its sponsorship income, because the accounts do not show that it comes from outside the group.
• A women's team's company often receives money from its own club. We count only what comes from outside the group, and nothing extra where the team is already inside the accounts we read.
• For seven clubs the group's accounts cannot yet be applied, because the documents do not print what is needed or, at Manchester United, because the change is large enough to need a release of its own. Their figures are unchanged on this point and each club's article says so.
• A check that used to require whole years for a summer signing now requires each length to agree with its dates. It still refuses the error it was written to catch.
• A new check stops a club's European revenue being switched off by mistake. It compares each club's record with the list of clubs in the league phase of their competition.
• We read every figure we take from the clubs' accounts against its page again. Twelve did not match. None of them is used in the ratio, and all are corrected. One, Nottingham Forest's amortisation for 2023/24, had been quoted in our article and was corrected there on 4 October.

What moved: Arsenal 60.4% → 60.7%; Aston Villa 75.7% → 76.0%; Bournemouth 85.2% → 85.5%; Brentford 83.9% → 84.1%; Brighton 79.7% → 79.5%; Chelsea 94.0% → 94.3%; Coventry 63.5% → 64.1%; Crystal Palace 78.0% → 78.5%; Everton 72.8% → 73.3%; Fulham 106.0% → 106.4%; Hull 66.4% → 67.0%; Ipswich 94.1% → 95.8%; Leeds 67.0% → 67.4%; Liverpool 73.9% → 74.0%; Manchester United 58.8% → 59.0%; Newcastle 84.2% → 83.9%; Nottingham Forest 102.5% → 103.4%; Sunderland 63.2% → 63.4%; Tottenham 82.1% → 82.3%

Also moved:ArsenalAston VillaBournemouthBrentfordBrightonChelseaCoventry CityCrystal PalaceEvertonFulhamHull CityIpswich TownLiverpoolManchester CityManchester UnitedNewcastleNottingham ForestSunderlandTottenham

We rebuilt the matchday income that the rule counts for every club. The rule takes last season's gate receipts per home match and multiplies by this season's home matches. We had not counted the matches properly and had not written down how we estimated the receipts. Both are now done: the matches are counted from archived match reports, and the receipts follow a published method. Fourteen clubs' squad cost ratios move, eight down and six up, and no club crosses a threshold.

• Home cup ties. The rule counts the average number of home FA Cup and League Cup matches over three seasons, rounded up. Twelve clubs had too few. Newcastle and Chelsea each played 13 in three seasons, so the rule counts five a season.
• Last season's home matches. The rule divides last season's receipts by every home match played. Eleven clubs' counts were wrong. Newcastle played 31 home matches, not 24; Crystal Palace 28, not 24; Chelsea 26, not 28.
• Last season's receipts. Most clubs have not filed 2025/26 accounts, so the figure is an estimate. For thirteen clubs it now starts from the last filed year, adjusted for the change in cup and European home matches and for 5% growth. Arsenal's earlier figure, raised for a European run that was no longer than the year before, is withdrawn.
• The largest movements are Tottenham, 79.4% to 77.6%, and Newcastle, 77.7% to 79.4%. At Fulham and Brentford the corrections cancel and the figure does not move.
• Manchester United's records take five small corrections to a signing date, two fees and two contract lengths, worth less than a hundredth of a point together.
• Every figure on the site is now rounded once, from the model's exact value. Three printed ranges change by a tenth of a point as a result.
• The method is set out in "How we estimate matchday revenue". A separate review of agents' fees on signings since the last accounts is under way and may raise these figures; we will report its result.

What moved: Tottenham 79.4% → 77.6%; Newcastle 77.7% → 79.4%; Crystal Palace 73.6% → 74.9%; Liverpool 70.6% → 69.6%; Everton 71.7% → 70.7%; Arsenal 55.8% → 56.6%; Chelsea 88.6% → 88.0%; Manchester United 58.7% → 58.1%; Aston Villa 71.9% → 72.5%; Brighton 77.8% → 77.4%; Nottingham Forest 96.7% → 97.0%; Bournemouth 83.0% → 82.8%; Coventry 61.2% → 61.0%; Manchester City 74.1% → 74.2%

Also moved:TottenhamNewcastleCrystal PalaceLiverpoolEvertonArsenalChelseaManchester UnitedAston VillaBrightonNottingham ForestBournemouthCoventry CityManchester CityFulhamBrentford

A further check of the transfer records the previous update could not settle: contract extensions, contract lengths, signing dates and fees, each now taken from the clubs' own announcements or the most reliable reports. Ten published ratios move, by between 0.1 and 0.6 points; no club crosses the 85% or 115% threshold.

• Crystal Palace's ratio rises from 73.0% to 73.6%, mainly because Queens Park Rangers are owed a fifth of Palace's profit on Eberechi Eze, which the figures had counted as Palace's.
• Bournemouth's falls from 83.5% to 83.0%, because Illia Zabarnyi cost more than recorded (27.7m, as Dynamo Kyiv have stated).
• Everton's falls from 72.0% to 71.7%, after Beto's and Iliman Ndiaye's fees and Youssef Chermiti's basic fee were corrected.
• Contract lengths and extensions were corrected where the clubs announced them, moving Leeds to 64.8%, Brighton to 77.8% and Aston Villa to 71.9%; smaller moves follow for Fulham, Arsenal, Manchester City and Sunderland.
• Three records were wrong in kind. A Brentford player recorded as released is still under contract, an Aston Villa player recorded as bought came through the academy, and a Bournemouth signing was dated a year early.
• Where no reliable source exists yet, the figure is kept and the most it could matter is recorded.

What moved: Crystal Palace 73.0% → 73.6%; Bournemouth 83.5% → 83.0%; Everton 72.0% → 71.7%; Leeds 64.5% → 64.8%; Brighton 78.1% → 77.8%; Aston Villa 71.7% → 71.9%; Fulham 102.4% → 102.6%; Arsenal 55.7% → 55.8%; Manchester City 74.2% → 74.1%; Sunderland 61.5% → 61.6%

Also moved:Crystal PalaceBournemouthEvertonBrightonAston VillaFulhamArsenalManchester CitySunderland

A further check of the transfer records behind every figure: players recorded as costing nothing, sale fees that included add-ons, contract terms and extensions, and fees a selling club owed to a player's former club. It also corrects the date at which departed players' remaining cost is measured for clubs whose year does not end on 30 June. Thirteen published ratios move, by between 0.1 and 1.0 points; no club crosses the 85% or 115% threshold.

• Aston Villa's ratio rises from 70.8% to 71.7%, because Middlesbrough are owed a fifth of Villa's profit on Morgan Rogers, about £20m, which the figures had counted as Villa's.
• Fees owed to former clubs are now deducted on the largest sales where a reliable report states them, which also raises Newcastle (Bruno Guimarães and Alexander Isak) to 77.7%, Bournemouth (Antoine Semenyo) to 83.5% and, with a sale fee that had been recorded in euros as pounds, Brighton to 78.1%.
• Every player sold for a fee while recorded as costing nothing is now checked; those who were in fact bought are either restored to their cost or listed with the most the gap could matter.
• Sale fees are now the guaranteed fee wherever the clubs or a reliable outlet state it, with add-ons kept separate; Chelsea's ratio rises to 88.6% and Liverpool's to 70.6%, and Crystal Palace's falls to 73.0%.
• Contract terms and extensions were corrected where a reliable source dates them; smaller moves follow for Tottenham, Arsenal, Nottingham Forest, Leeds, Coventry City and Ipswich Town.
• For Arsenal, Liverpool and Coventry, whose accounts end on 31 May, the remaining cost of players who have left is now measured at that date rather than 30 June; Arsenal's ratio falls to 55.7%.
• Where no reliable source exists yet, the figure is kept and the most it could matter is recorded.

What moved: Aston Villa 70.8% → 71.7%; Brighton 77.2% → 78.1%; Newcastle 76.7% → 77.7%; Bournemouth 83.1% → 83.5%; Chelsea 88.4% → 88.6%; Liverpool 70.5% → 70.6%; Crystal Palace 73.1% → 73.0%; Nottingham Forest 96.9% → 96.7%; Tottenham 79.3% → 79.4%; Arsenal 55.8% → 55.7%; Leeds 64.6% → 64.5%; Coventry City 61.3% → 61.2%; Ipswich Town 88.9% → 88.8%

Also moved:Aston VillaBrightonNewcastleBournemouthChelseaLiverpoolCrystal PalaceNottingham ForestTottenhamArsenalCoventry CityIpswich Town

Four new structural gates, and the corrections they forced. The largest: Chelsea’s figure falls from 101.5% to 87.6%, because ten registrations already inside the filed book value were also being charged individually. No new football or accounting events: the data cutoff is unchanged.

• No double amortisation: a registration inside the filed closing book value that is also charged player by player must now be declared and taken out of the pooled balance, or the run refuses. This is the gate that found Chelsea’s ten double-counted registrations.
• A closed list of registration categories. Invented category labels had hidden two Tottenham loan wages, Marmoush and Mudryk, about £20m, from both the loan ledger and the wage bridge.
• A player who has left leaves the pooled book value by the date he was acquired, whatever his label (Reijnders at Manchester City).
• Signings dated on the first of a month just after a year end must be evidenced. About 36 such rows across 14 clubs were sourced or redated to their real dates.
• A fix found by the new tests: the extension audit looked for one specific category name, and a relabel had silently switched it off at Chelsea. It now covers every grandfathered registration.
• Liverpool: Frimpong and Mamardashvili treated as signed after the 31 May 2025 year end, on the announcement evidence. The figure stays at 71.5%, about 69.7% if both were inside the book value; reopened when the 2025/26 accounts are filed.

What moved: Chelsea 101.5% → 87.6%; Manchester City 79.1% → 75.4%; Tottenham 79.5% → 81.7%; Brentford 84.5% → 81.2%; Brighton 77.8% → 76.9%; Bournemouth 80.6% → 80.8%; Leeds 64.5% → 64.6%. Every other club unchanged.

Also moved:ChelseaManchester CityTottenhamBrightonBrentfordBournemouthLiverpool

Every club’s departures are now declared from sources, window by window, and reconciled against its ledger in both directions. All 20 clubs were migrated to the new check, and it is enforced: a departure missing on either side refuses the run.

• A declared departure with no matching sale in the ledger refuses; a sale in the ledger missing from the declaration refuses. Dates that differ by more than a week, or fall in a different financial year, refuse.
• Free transfers, releases, retirements and contract expiries are exits, not sales, and are never counted as departures.
• Migrating each club from its sources found missing sales, wrong dates and misclassified exits at several clubs. Each was corrected under its own record before the club was declared.

What moved: Chelsea 103.1% → 101.5%; Fulham 101.3% → 102.0%; Nottingham Forest 99.5% → 99.6% (missing sales, sale dates and the Jota Silva sale); Newcastle 76.7% → 77.1%; Brighton 77.6% → 77.8%; Brentford 84.2% → 84.5%; Everton 73.5% → 73.3%; Manchester United 58.6% → 58.7%. Others unchanged at published precision.

Also moved:ArsenalAston VillaBournemouthBrentfordBrightonChelseaCoventry CityCrystal PalaceEvertonFulhamHull CityIpswich TownLiverpoolManchester CityManchester UnitedNewcastleNottingham ForestSunderlandTottenham

A new cross-club check: no player may be current at two clubs at once. Its first run across the 20 ledgers found four contradictions, all corrected before the check was switched on.

• Tynan Thompson was still current at Tottenham while Manchester United recorded him as a permanent arrival: a Tottenham sale was missing.
• Dominic Calvert-Lewin (Everton and Leeds), and Frankie Runham and Christopher Atherton (Chelsea and Ipswich) were each on two books.
• Names are matched across spellings and accents (Nørgaard and Norgaard are one player), and genuine namesakes are declared pair by pair, never excused everywhere.

Also moved:TottenhamManchester UnitedEvertonChelseaIpswich Town

A second way to build wages, for clubs whose last filed accounts describe a Championship season: the 2026/27 squad’s wages are built player by player from sources, with the filed payroll kept as a check. No published figure moved.

• For these clubs, rolling the filed payroll forward would have meant a change of 30% or more, mostly assumption.
• One wage function now serves the central estimate, the stress case and the simulation, so a second method cannot be half-applied.

Also moved:SunderlandCoventry CityHull CityIpswich Town