Which Premier League Team Earns £1 Billion The Fastest?

With the subject of Premier League football players’ wages proving ever-topical, it’s no wonder the salaries of players in the top-flight of English football consistently come under fire.

To find out which club and player in the top-flight English league could be the quickest to earn £1 billion, we conducted an in-depth study looking into the earnings of players, both annually and per minute, for each of the top 10 Premier League clubs*. With Tottenham, Manchester City, and Liverpool all hot on each other’s heels, which club and player could potentially rank as the fastest earning?

The fastest earning Premier League teams

In a bid to find out how long it could potentially take each Premier League team’s players to earn £1 million, £100 million, and £1 billion, we studied the annual salary and minutes played of each squad player in the 2020/21 season so far.

How long it takes Premier League teams to earn £1 million

The Premier League team that could potentially earn £1 million the fastest, based on how much each of their players earns per minute played, is Tottenham Hotspur. Our study predicts it could take Tottenham players 2 minutes and 40 seconds to earn £1 million based on their players’ earnings.

Manchester City comes next, with our study predicting it could take just 3 minutes and 37 seconds for the team to potentially earn £1 million, according to our analysis of players’ combined earnings per minute.

Potentially ranking in third is Chelsea, with the top-flight team estimated to earn £1 million in just 4 minutes and 8 seconds based on how much their players earn per minute spent on the pitch.

The Blues were shortly followed by Manchester United, who are estimated to take just 12 seconds longer to potentially earn £1 million. Their squad’s pay per minute on the pitch means it would take The Red Devils 4 minutes and 20 seconds to reach the £1 million mark.

Placing as the fifth fastest team to earn £1 million is last season’s Premier League champions, Liverpool. Our analysis found that The Reds were estimated to take 4 minutes and 46 seconds to earn this figure.

How long it takes Premier League teams to earn £100 million

Our analysis found that it could take Tottenham Hotspur’s squad an estimated 266 minutes and 15 seconds to earn £100 million. This is equivalent to roughly 4 hours and 26 minutes in total, or just under three 90-minute football matches.

It could take Manchester City an estimated 362 minutes and 28 seconds to potentially earn £100 million, which is equivalent to roughly 6 hours and 2 minutes, or four football matches!

For Chelsea, our analysis estimates that it could take the squad 414 minutes and 4 seconds to potentially earn £100 million, which translates to around 6 hours and 54 minutes or four and a half football matches.

For Manchester United, we estimate it could take the squad around 433 minutes to potentially earn £100 million. This is equivalent to roughly 7 hours and 13 minutes, or just under five football matches.

How long it takes Premier League teams to earn £1 billion

To make a hefty £1 billion, our study estimated that it could take the Spurs squad around 2,662 minutes and 29 seconds. This is equivalent to one day, 20 hours and 22 minutes, or 29 and a half football matches.

For Manchester City, this figure was 3,624 minutes and 45 seconds, meaning it could take around 2 days, 12 hours and 24 minutes (40 football matches) for their team to earn £1 billion.

Our study predicted that it could take Chelsea’s team 4,140 minutes and 37 seconds to reach the £1 billion mark. In other words, this is 2 days and 21 hours, or 46 football matches.

Comparatively, it could take the fourth fastest earning club, Manchester United, 4,333 minutes and 16 seconds to earn £1 billion, based on each player’s pay per minute on the pitch. This is the same as 3 days and 13 minutes, or 48 football matches.

Liverpool, the fifth fastest earning squad, is estimated to take 4,759 minutes and 15 seconds to earn £1 billion, which is equivalent to just 3 days, 7 hours and 19 minutes, or almost 53 football matches.

Which players earn £1 billion the fastest from each Premier League team?

After finding out which team could collectively earn £1 billion the quickest, we sought to find out the fastest (and slowest) player from the top 10 teams in the top-flight league to earn £1 billion based on their estimated annual salary and number of minutes spent on the pitch so far this season.

We estimate that Tottenham Hotspur’s Gareth Bale can earn £1 billion in just 5,160 minutes and 15 seconds on the pitch, equivalent to just 3 and a half days or 57 football matches.

Comparatively, City’s Sergio Aguero can earn £1 billion in an estimated 11,782 minutes and 24 seconds on the pitch, which is equivalent to 8 days, 4 hours and 22 minutes, or almost 131 football matches – 74 more games than Bale in first place!

The third fastest player to earn £1 million is Manchester United’s Edinson Cavani, with the striker estimated to earn £1 billion in 35,439 minutes and 34 seconds on the pitch. This is equivalent to 24 days, 14 hours and 39 minutes, or almost 394 football matches.

For Southampton, the fastest earner was Fraser Forster. The goalie has to spend an estimated 24,725 minutes and 16 seconds on the pitch in order to earn £1 billion. This is equivalent to 17 days, 4 hours and 5 minutes, or almost 275 football matches.

Kepa Arrizabalaga, Chelsea’s #1 and fastest earner, has to spend an estimated 34,615 minutes and 23 seconds on the pitch to earn £1 billion. This is equivalent to 24 days and 55 minutes, or 384 and a half football matches.

For West Ham United, the fastest earning player was Andriy Yarmolenko, who would have to spend around 40,301 minutes on the pitch to earn £1 billion. This is equivalent to 27 days, 23 hours and 41 minutes, or almost 448 football matches.

We found that it could take West Ham’s Declan Rice 9,807,692 minutes and 18 seconds to earn £1 billion – the longest of all players in the top 10 teams considered in our study. This is equivalent to 6,810 days (18 and a half years), or 108,974 football matches.

Aston Villa’s Ezri Konsa could take the second longest to earn £1 billion, with our study finding that it would take 2,704,326 minutes and 55 seconds. This is equivalent to 1,878 days (five years), or 30,048 football matches!

Harvey Barnes of Leicester City is estimated to take the third longest to reach the £1 billion mark – 2,292,307 minutes and 42 seconds to be exact. This equates to around 1,591 days (four years), or 25,470 football matches.

Liverpool’s slowest earner, Curtis Jones, would need to spend an estimated 1,917,142 minutes and 51 seconds on the pitch to earn £1 billion, according to our study. That’s equivalent to 1,331 days (three and a half years), or 21,301 football matches.

Southampton’s slowest earning player was Jan Bednarek, as our analysis revealed he would have to spend an estimated 1,384,615 minutes and 23 seconds on the pitch in order to earn £1 billion. This equates to around 961 days (two and a half years), or 15,384 football matches.

The players earning the most and least per minute played

We also sought to discover which players within the top 10 fastest earning teams pocketed the most and least money per minute played so far this season.

The highest-paid players per minute played

Estimated to have earned around £193,788 per minute on the pitch, Tottenham’s Gareth Bale potentially earns the most. With an estimated annual salary of £31,200,000 and just 161 minutes played on the pitch, Bale is the fastest earning player of all Premier League clubs so far this season.

Sergio Aguero is estimated to be the second fastest earning player in the Premier League, earning around £84,872 per minute on the pitch. Despite not holding the highest annual salary at his club (Manchester City), Aguero only played for 141 minutes, meaning he had the second-best pay per minute played. Aguero’s teammate Zack Steffen also ranks among the top 10, with an estimated earning of £26,577 per minute spent on the pitch.

Two Chelsea players are also among the top 10 best-paid players per minute. Kepa Arrizabalaga and Antonio Rudiger were found to earn an estimated £28,888 each per minute played in our study.

The lowest-paid players per minute played

We can reveal that Declan Rice, of West Ham, is estimated to earn the lowest amount per minute (£101). Despite the midfielder earning £156,000 annually, Rice played the highest number of minutes on the pitch, which means that his earnings per minute were the lowest of all players in the Premier League.

Ezri Konsa from Aston Villa is estimated to be the second lowest paid player per minute played according to our study. Owing to the fact the defender has one of the lowest annual salaries (£416,000) and has spent 1,125 minutes on the pitch so far this season, Konsa is estimated to only earn around £369 per minute played.

Konsa was shortly followed by Harvey Barnes of Leicester City, who was estimated to earn £436 per minute played. Barnes has an estimated annual salary of £520,000 and has spent 1,192 minutes on the pitch this season, resulting in the midfielder ranking among the bottom 10 players earning the least per minute.

Liverpool’s Curtis Jones ranked as the fourth lowest paid player per minute, estimated to have earned £521 per minute spent on the pitch. With an estimated annual salary of £350,000 and having played 671 minutes on the pitch this season, Jones is also considered to be among the lowest-paid per minute.

Average earnings per minute, per player by Premier League team

Lastly, we delved into how much on average each team’s players earned based on their collective earnings and minutes played.

Tottenham players earned the most for each minute played, earning an estimated £16,069 per player, on average.

In second is Manchester City, whose players were estimated to earn £12,540 each on average, and their Mancunion rivals came in third, with Manchester United players estimated to earn £11,538 per minute.

Following closely behind is Chelsea, whose players were estimated to earn £11,500 each per minute on the pitch – £38 less than The Red Devils – and fifth goes to the 2019/20 champions, Liverpool, with players estimated to earn £9,550 per minute.

*Methodology

1. GamblingDeals.com looked at the top 10 Premier League football teams. The top 10 were devised by analysing the total points for each team so far in the 2020/2021 season. The top 10 Premier League Teams by points at the time of writing are, in order:

Manchester United, Liverpool, Manchester City, Leicester City, Everton, Tottenham Hotspur, Southampton, Aston Villa, Chelsea, and West Ham United.

2. Only active players were selected from each team, and only players who have played more than 90 minutes since the start of the 2020/21 season were analysed.

3. Total minute time played was sourced from the official Premier League website for each respective player.

4. Annual salaries were sourced from Spotrac.com.

5. The average cost per minute for each player was calculated by taking the annual salary for each respective player (provided by sportrac.com) and dividing it by the total minutes played for each respective player (sourced from premierleague.com).

6. Data was collected on 15/01/2021 and is correct as of then, but is subject to change as the season progresses.