Newcastle may be in a fight to secure European qualification – but they’d be better off if they miss out altogether rather than sealing a Conference League spot.
That’s the view of financial expert Kieran Maguire, who has laid bare the club’s financial situation – despite the Magpies enjoying a record turnover of £335.3million for the 2024/25 financial year.
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On Tuesday, the Toon posted their accounts, which showed an increase of £15m the previous year.
Though that was largely due to selling the 72-year leasehold on St James’ Park to a subsidiary company for £172.1m, which generated £129m in paper profit.
Without that, they would have posted a club-record £98.4m loss, but instead, the ‘sale trick’, which has been used by Chelsea in the past, saw them declare a total pre-tax profit of £34.7m.
It was good news for fans amid concerns they could potentially breach Profitability and Sustainability Rules [PSR] in what has been a frustrating season so far.
Having crashed out of the Carabao Cup, FA Cup and Champions League in the space of six weeks, Newcastle have also struggled for consistency in the Premier League.
Sitting 12th in the table following a 2-1 defeat to bitter rivals Sunderland, the Tyneside outfit are in a fight to be playing across the continent next term.
The Premier League are on course to benefit from an extra Champions League place by UEFA, with the Europa League spots extending from sixth to seventh should a team that finishes in the top five win the FA Cup.
Currently, Arsenal, Manchester City and Liverpool remain in the tournament ahead of this weekend’s quarter-finals.
If any of those teams triumph and secure Champions League football, those hunting a spot in the Conference League will need to finish in eighth, as Carabao Cup holders City, who earned a Conference spot by beating Arsenal in the final, will not be able to participate if they finish in the top five.
As it stands, Newcastle are just four points behind Everton, who sit in in eighth place with just seven games to go.
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However, Maguire has warned Toon fans dreaming of another European adventure – potentially in Europe’s third-tier competition – that it may not be beneficial in the long run.
Speaking on the latest episode of eSPORTY’s Inside The Toon, Maguire said: “The weird things is, I think the club finishing eighth [or ninth] in the Premier League, is going to end up being in a better position than the club finishing seventh that qualifies for the Conference.
“Because if you qualify for the Conference, you have to abide by UEFA’s rules which say that you can only spend 70 per cent of your revenue on player costs.
“If you don’t qualify for Europe and finish eighth [or ninth], you can spend 85 per cent [instead of 85 per cent under Premier League rules].
“I had a long conversation with the club, and [a Newcastle figure] said, ‘Yeah, Albania on a Thursday night, nobody particularly wants to go there from the club, apart from the fans, and we certainly don’t want to do that from the boardroom point of view.'”
Host Olly Clink was left baffled by the notion that for financial gain, Newcastle would be better off without plying their trade in the Conference League.
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To which Maguire remarked: “Yes, I think it’s a classic case of unintended consequences.
“So what the Premier League wanted to do, was to make sure that those clubs that were regularly not qualifying for Europe, to give them a little bit of a bonus, a little bit of a benefit to try to encourage them to try them to encourage them to vote in favour of the SCR [Squad Cost Ratio] rules.
“And it has to be remembered, that the vote was 14-6, so you have to have a two-thirds majority, so it was the bare majority, it was always the bare vote that went through to allow this change, and therefore concessions were given.
“But I don’t think it was necessarily thought through, but some of the smarter kids in the room have already crunched the numbers and have worked out that you’ve got this overhang, which does seem crazy.
“The way that the money is distributed under the UEFA rules, is that if you’re in the Champions League, for every £1 you get there, you get 22p in the Europa League itself, and then you only get 11p in the Conference.
“And as you can see, it’s not really worth the effort from the club’s financial point of view.
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“But football clubs are far more than surely about financing, because Newcastle United didn’t get a lot of money from winning the Carabao Cup [£100k] last year, but they still created memories which will stay with fans forever.”
Maguire was then pressed as to how the club’s financial situation could impact their summer business.
It comes amid comments made by Newcastle CEO David Hopkinson, where he stated that the club may need to sell a high-profile in the upcoming window.
Sandro Tonali, Bruno Guimaraes, Tino Livramento and Anthony Gordon have all been linked with moves away from St James’ Park.
Though Maguire believes that Newcastle remain in a healthy position to invest following their Champions League run to the last-16 this campaign.
He stated: “I think they’ve got the benefit of making the Champions League, so the UEFA rules are based on a calendar year, so that will be in the club’s benefit.
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“As far as the sale of Alexander Isak [£125m] is concerned, one third of that [£41.67m] will go into the SCR calculations, so that’s a positive as well.
“So I think the club has got room to manoeuvre, clearly it doesn’t want to oversell its position, as it doesn’t want to have to go and pay the Newcastle tax, which perhaps existed two or three seasons ago when PIF [Public Investment Fund] initially acquired the club.
“So I think dampening down expectations makes sense, but based on my figures, the club can spend, you have to remember that it is player trading, and player trading involves both the in door and the out door.
“Trying to work out what a big spend is these days is difficult.”
