London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Monday, Sep 15, 2025

No, Piers Morgan, Lionel Messi isn’t about to sell enough shirts to cover his salary

No, Piers Morgan, Lionel Messi isn’t about to sell enough shirts to cover his salary

There is a false confidence that men – and it is almost always men – are imbued with when they start talking about football. You see it in pubs and on fan forums. The conversation quickens and reverts to clichés. Endless sentences start with “Of course, you know” and tail off into nothingness. Chat about football is the great enabler of tedious platitudes passed off as genius.
Piers Morgan tweeted on Tuesday about the signing of Lionel Messi, perhaps the world’s greatest footballer, who has been bought by Paris Saint-Germain from Barcelona for a reported €35m a year. Messi had just been unveiled as the club’s latest signing, and Paris Saint-Germain – backed by Qatar Sports Investments – had started selling shirts emblazoned with the player’s name and number.

“PSG will get their Messi money back in shirt sales in six months,” Morgan wrote. “Great business.” His friend Mark Austin, a Sky News presenter, also heralded the signing as a good business decision. “PSG will soon get their dosh back,” he confidently tweeted.

Except they won’t, and never will. The idea that multi-million pound or euro investments can be recouped through the sale of overpriced jerseys is one of football’s most intractable and unlikely myths. Its persistence reveals a lot about the way we think and talk about the national game.

“To give you some context, most football shirt deals, 85 to 90 per cent will go to the manufacturer,” said Chris Lepkowski, a sports journalism lecturer at Birmingham City University. Those manufacturers are a small coterie of some of sports apparel’s biggest names, such as Nike, Adidas or Puma.

The manufacturer/club split isn’t a flat rate across the entirety of football, however. Some clubs have managed to wangle slightly more generous deals. “Bayern Munich have a big link in with Adidas which helps them,” said Lepkowski, as do Liverpool, who signed a £30 million a year deal with Nike in 2020 that reportedly gives them 20 per cent of each £80 sale. “But on the whole, you’re looking at 10 to 15 per cent,” Lepkowski added.

Lepkowski has done the sums on the back of an envelope – which, to his credit, is probably more than many people confidently tweeting about the business prowess of Paris Saint-Germain have done – and managed to figure out how many replica shirts would need to be sold by the French club to recoup the cost of buying one of the world’s most recognisable players.

It’s 18 million.

“PSG, I believe, average about 750,000 shirt sales a year, which is good,” he said. “They would need, in three years, to sell 18 million shirts to cover the cost, and that’s only from the shirt sales... You’re dealing with what is effectively one of football’s big myths.”

The reason the myth persists is largely to do with the gulf between the realities of modern-day football and how fans in the stadium and at the turnstiles interact with it. “A lot of it is disinformation or failure to understand the way football operates – the mechanics and finance in football,” said Lepkowski. Football has become big business, with non-transparent financial structures that the average fan takes little time to try and learn.

“For instance, you’ll see people talking about free transfers or net spend on transfers,” said Lepkowski. “Neither are relevant. You won’t get a free transfer in football. There are costs on top of any contract – a signing on-fee or a bigger fee going to the agent, and that player will be on bigger wages than he would be had he been under contract elsewhere.”

The other reason is the banality of most conversations around football. Football punditry is often mind-numbingly tedious, and provides little actual insight. That includes commentary from former players – who presumably know better – repeating the line because they have little constructive to add.

“They’ve worked in football, and they push that myth,” said Lepkowski. Even Morgan is within the online football fan orbit as a known celebrity Arsenal supporter. “People do associate him with being a big football fan,” Lepkowski added. “When people like that peddle comments like that, it doesn’t help.”

And yet, when the next big player to switch clubs decides to move to a new team, the same tired line will undoubtedly appear. But remember, said Lepkowski: “You cannot physically sell that number of shirts to get that money back. It’s wishful thinking. The notion that 18 million people will all, from somewhere, decide to buy a PSG shirt is extremely unrealistic. It’s not going to happen.”
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
U.S. and China Agree on Framework to Shift TikTok to American Ownership
London Daily Podcast: London Massive Pro Democracy Rally, Musk Support, UK Economic Data and Premier League Results Mark Eventful Weekend
This Week in AI: Meta’s Superintelligence Push, xAI’s Ten Billion-Dollar Raise, Genesis AI’s Robotics Ambitions, Microsoft Restructuring, Amazon’s Million-Robot Milestone, and Google’s AlphaGenome Update
Le Pen Tightens the Pressure on Macron as France Edges Toward Political Breakdown
Musk calls for new UK government at huge pro-democracy rally in London, but Britons have been brainwashed to obey instead of fighting for their human rights
Elon Musk responds to post calling for the murder of Erika Kirk, widow of Charlie Kirk: 'Either we fight back or they will kill us'
Czech Republic signs €1.34 billion contract for Leopard 2A8 main battle tanks with delivery from 2028
USA: Office Depot Employees Refused to Print Poster in Memory of Charlie Kirk – and Were Fired
Proposed U.S. Bill Would Allow Civil Suits Against Judges Who Release Repeat Violent Offenders
Penske Media Sues Google Over “AI Overviews,” Claiming It Uses Journalism Without Consent and Destroys Traffic
Indian Student Engineers Propose “Project REBIRTH” to Protect Aircraft from Crashes Using AI, Airbags and Smart Materials
French Debt Downgrade Piles Pressure on Macron’s New Prime Minister
US and UK Near Tech, Nuclear and Whisky Deals Ahead of Trump Trip
One in Three Europeans Now Uses TikTok, According to the Chinese Tech Giant
Could AI Nursing Robots Help Healthcare Staffing Shortages?
NATO Deploys ‘Eastern Sentry’ After Russian Drones Violate Polish Airspace
Anesthesiologist Left Operation Mid-Surgery to Have Sex with Nurse
Tens of Thousands of Young Chinese Get Up Every Morning and Go to Work Where They Do Nothing
The New Life of Novak Djokovic
The German Owner of Politico Mathias Döpfner Eyes Further U.S. Media Expansion After Axel Springer Restructuring
Suspect Arrested: Utah Man in Custody for Charlie Kirk’s Fatal Shooting
In a politically motivated trial: Bolsonaro Sentenced to 27 Years for Plotting Coup After 2022 Defeat
German police raid AfD lawmaker’s offices in inquiry over Chinese payments
Turkish authorities seize leading broadcaster amid fraud and tax investigation
Volkswagen launches aggressive strategy to fend off Chinese challenge in Europe’s EV market
ChatGPT CEO signals policy to alert authorities over suicidal youth after teen’s death
The British legal mafia hit back: Banksy mural of judge beating protester is scrubbed from London court
Surpassing Musk: Larry Ellison becomes the richest man in the world
Embarrassment for Starmer: He fired the ambassador photographed on Epstein’s 'pedophile island'
Manhunt after 'skilled sniper' shot Charlie Kirk. Footage: Suspect running on rooftop during panic
Effective Protest Results: Nepal’s Prime Minister Resigns as Youth-Led Unrest Shakes the Nation
Qatari prime minister says Netanyahu ‘killed any hope’ for Israeli hostages
King Charles and Prince Harry Share First In-Person Moment in 19 Months
Starmer Establishes Economic ‘Budget Board’ to Centralise Policy and Rebuild Business Trust
France Erupts in Mass ‘Block Everything’ Protests on New PM’s First Day
Poland Shoots Down Russian Drones in Airspace Violation During Ukraine Attack
Brazilian police say ex-President Bolsonaro had planned to flee to Argentina seeking asylum
Trinidad Leader Applauds U.S. Naval Strike and Advocates Forceful Action Against Traffickers
Kim Jong Un Oversees Final Test of New High-Thrust Solid-Fuel Rocket Engine
Apple Introduces Ultra-Thin iPhone Air, Enhanced 17 Series and New Health-Focused Wearables
Macron Appoints Sébastien Lecornu as Prime Minister Amid Budget Crisis and Political Turmoil
Supreme Court temporarily allows Trump to pause billions in foreign aid
Charlie Sheen says his father, Martin Sheen, turned him in to the police: 'The greatest betrayal possible'
Vatican hosts first Catholic LGBTQ pilgrimage
Apple Unveils iPhone 17 Series, iPhone Air, Apple Watch 11 and More at 'Awe Dropping' Event
Pig Heads Left Outside Multiple Paris Mosques in Outrage-Inducing Acts
Nvidia’s ‘Wow’ Factor Is Fading. The AI chip giant used to beat Wall Street expectations for earnings by a substantial margin. That trajectory is coming down to earth.
France joins Eurozone’s ‘periphery’ as turmoil deepens, say investors
On the Anniversary of Queen Elizabeth’s Death: Prince Harry Returns to Britain
France Faces New Political Crisis, again, as Prime Minister Bayrou Pushed Out
×