Who will win the big-5 league titles?

The correlation between money and success is more and more apparent in European football. The CIES Football Observatory used the indicator of the transfer expenditure in signing squad members to forecast the final table of the big-5 leagues. All data is presented in issue number 116 of the Weekly Post.

In total, big-5 league teams have spent a record figure of 9.3 billion euro to sign current squad members. The gaps between clubs are tremendous: from 587 million for Real Madrid to less than one million for Carpi, Frosinone, GFCO Ajaccio, Rayo Vallecano and Sporting Gijón.

From the perspective of transfer market investments, one would expect that Real Madrid, Manchester City, Paris St-Germain, Bayern Munich and Juventus win the title in their respective leagues. Conversely, at English Premier League level, Bournemouth, Watford and Norwich should face relegation just one year after promotion.

For a detailed analysis of the link between transfer expenditure and success, refer to issue number 3 of the CIES Football Observatory Monthly Report.