An exclusive Reach investigation has shown that supporting a football club in England is more expensive than ever before
Liverpool fans at Anfield
Supporting a football club is more expensive than ever before in England, an exclusive Reach investigation has found – and now you can see just how much each club charges its fans.
The Cost of Football is Reach’s annual investigation into how much each club in the top four divisions of English football charges its fans. It’s the largest of its kind in the country, and looks at three key items – season tickets, match tickets and shirt prices. And for the first time this year it also focuses on the prices of top category “Cat A” matches.
It found that while some clubs have frozen ticket prices amidst the cost of living crisis, overall things are getting more expensive. The average cost of season tickets, match tickets and replica shirts have all increased to record levels.
The most expensive season tickets cost £3,000 each. Big-game match tickets at one club start at £70 apiece and cost as much as £240 at another. And three clubs are charging £60 for kids’ replica shirts.
You can see how each club compares against the others in their division using our gadget:
Season Tickets
The cost of Liverpool’s most and least expensive season tickets have gone up this season.
Most Read
The most expensive that the club offers have increased from £869.00 last season to £886.00 this season.
The cheapest, meanwhile, have risen from £685.00 to £699.00.
The average cost for the cheapest adult season ticket at each Premier League and EFL club is now £399.88. That’s the highest on record.
The average is also at record high levels for each division – £535.13 in the Premier League, £377.04 in the Championship, £368.34 in League One, and £341.56 in League Two.
The most expensive season tickets that clubs offer cost a record average of £610.15 across all four divisions. In the Premier League the average is £1,042.25, in the Championship it’s £581.73, in League One it’s £479.84, and in League Two it’s £407.61.
Fulham offer the most expensive season ticket in the country at a whopping £3,000.00. That’s followed by Tottenham Hotspur (£2,015.00), Arsenal (£1,895.50), West Ham United (£1,620.00), and Manchester City (£1,030.00).
The cheapest adult season ticket for Arsenal costs £973.00, which is more than the equivalent at any other club.
Tottenham charge the next most for their cheapest ticket (£807.00) followed by Liverpool (£699,00).
Match tickets
Single adult match tickets for league games without membership discounts across the top four divisions range from £9.00 at Liverpool to an eye watering £240.00 at Chelsea.
Liverpool’s cheapest tickets have remained at £9.00 since the 2016/17 season, while their most expensive tickets cost £59.00 each from 2015/16 and are now £60.00.
The cheapest tickets that clubs offer across all four divisions cost an average of £24.29 each. That’s excluding family area tickets, which often require the purchase of junior tickets as well. The most expensive, meanwhile, cost an average of £40.32. However, a total of 21 clubs, including Manchester City, haven’t produced a publicly available list of prices for each match category.
They are – Burnley, Crystal Palace, Fulham, Luton Town, Manchester City, Manchester United, Newcastle United, Nottingham Forest, Wolverhampton Wanderers, Birmingham City, Blackburn Rovers, Ipswich Town, Queens Park Rangers, Sunderland, Watford, Bristol Rovers, Charlton Athletic, Fleetwood Town, Port Vale, Shrewsbury Town and Wigan Athletic.
Clubs often adopt a tiered pricing structure for different categories of matches.
The top tier, which in this project we’ve named “Cat A”, are usually against the division’s top sides, or a local rival, and as such are more expensive.
Arsenal have the most expensive starting point for “Cat A” matches, with tickets starting at £70.00 each.
Tickets at the Gunners go up to £103.00 for the big games, which used to be the most expensive in the country.
However, Chelsea are now offering match tickets for as much as £240.00 in their premium Westview area. The most expensive ‘normal’ tickets at Stamford Bridge cost £76.00 each.
Replica shirts
The cost of an adult Liverpool replica top is now £75.00 on the club’s online store.
That may not quite be the most expensive in the division, but it’s an increase of £5.00 from last year, and £15.00 over five years.
Junior shirts have, however, remained at £55.00 each.
The average cost of an adult replica top across the top four divisions is now £54.14, the highest on record.
Premier League shirts cost an average of £68.37 each, which is also a record.
In the Championship the average is £54.50, in League One it’s £49.48, and in League Two it’s £46.98.
Arsenal, Fulham, Manchester United and Tottenham have the most expensive standard adult replica shirts at £80.00 each.
The cost of junior shirts have also increased.
The average across all four divisions is now £41.98, while in the Premier League it’s as high as £51.21.
Three Premier League clubs charge £60.00 for their junior shirts – Manchester City, Tottenham and West Ham.
Reach PLC is the Echo’s parent company.
