By Tony Attwood
In the last four years, Burnley have been promoted twice and relegated twice. The difference between their performances in the Championship in 2024/25 and 20 22/23 on the one hand and their performance in the Premier League in 2023/24 and 2021/22 are quite extraordinary.
In the Premier League in 2021/2 they got 35 points. The following season in the Championship they got 101 points. But then in the Premier League in 2023/24 they got 24 points. The next season (last season in fact) they got 100 points.
| Team | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | Burnley 2025 Championship | 46 | 28 | 16 | 2 | 69 | 16 | 53 | 100 |
| 19 | Burnley 2024 PL | 38 | 5 | 9 | 24 | 41 | 78 | -37 | 24 |
| 1 | Burnley 2023 Championship | 46 | 29 | 14 | 3 | 87 | 35 | 52 | 101 |
| 18 | Burnley 2022 PL | 38 | 7 | 14 | 17 | 34 | 53 | -19 | 35 |
This shows a gap between the Premier League and the Championship that is now so great that promoting three clubs from the Championship each season only to see them fall back down to that league after one year in the top division, looks (from a football point of view) quite ludicrous.
It is true of course, that in 2021/22 the three clubs that came up (Fulham, Bournemouth and Nottingham Forest) and have established themselves in the Premier League, but this has not been the case for any of the nine clubs since that season. The gap, it seems, has got too big.
Indeed, if you fancied a flutter on Leeds United, Burnley and Sunderland going down at the end of 2025/26 you would find the odds rather disappointing. The bookies are giving Sunderland an 80% chance of going down, and for Burnley, despite their recent experience in the top flight that reduces only slightly to 71.4%. Even Leeds United, who have a history in the top tier, have a probability implied by their odds of 54% of going straight back down.
Now it can be argued, and indeed I have suggested myself, that Championship teams go for promotion in order to make money out of one season in the Premier League, and yet despite promotion to the Premier League in both 2023 and 2025 Burnley still lost money. £28m before tax in their last tax year in fact.
It is true that they have said that things are looking up, since in the season before that in the Championship, they lost £36m in the Championship. But the fact is that even though a club’s income is likely to more than double (as Burnley’s did from £65m to £134m), and while money can be made from selling players as a result of promotion, losses still increase.
And this is interesting in the case of Burnley since they have been seen as a club that makes money. Yet even they can lose £64m across two seasons of this yo-yo game of promotion and relegation.
In fact, in playing this yo-yo model, Burnley has only made a profit once – and that was in the Covid season, so it doesn’t really reveal a model that can be used for the future.
In short, what makes matters worse for the whole model of Championship football with its chance of promotion to the Rich League is that Burnley have contrived to lose money both in the seasons in which they win the Championship and seasons in which they play in the Premier League.
Now, the problem with debating this is that matters quickly and indeed readily become confused, because you can read statements in the media such as “Burnley… had one of the best financial performances in the Premier League in the five years up to 2023/24.” Yes indeed; they lost £31m. In the financial league for that season, they were the seventh-best club.
In fact the losses of clubs playing in the Championship can be utterly horrific – for the last set of results, well over half of the clubs in that league lost over £100m. Four of them lost more than three times as much.
Now with figures like this, it is easy to say, “This can’t go on.” The clubs lose money in the Championship and then in the Premier League, so there is no way out. The only reason rich people own clubs is either because they like the sense of power in owning a club or because they aim to sell the club on to someone even richer.
That of course, can work for a while, but ultimately, we are going to run out of both very stupid rich people, and rich people who think that they alone can turn the club around financially.
In essence, the Championship is not financially sustainable. And that means that there is an element of the Premier League that is not sustainable since we already have a fairly good idea of which three clubs will go down at the end of the forthcoming season. Leeds United, Burnley (again) and Sunderland.
This doesn’t affect Arsenal of course, since this coming season is Arsenal’s 100th consecutive season in the top league, (the only club ever to achieve this and over 40 years ahead of the second club who might achieve it) but it would be good to see something financially viable exisining to ensure that football in its present form, might last.
We could definitely do with some new blood in the PL. Bristol City look good with their excellent stadium and support, while Wrexham would shake a few people up.