Stefan Borson taken aback as Liverpool player costs go through the roof
Liverpool’s wage bill increase is difficult to understand due to the club’s lack of Champions League football last season.
That is the view of finance expert Stefan Borson, who exclusively told Football Insider the Merseyside giants’ salary expenditure has been “very high” for the past few years.
Deloitte’s 2025 Money League revealed Liverpool’s wages rose from £373million in 2022-23 to £387million last season.
Jordan Henderson, James Milner, Fabinho, Naby Keita, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Roberto Firmino completed permanent exits in the summer of 2023, while several players also left the club on loan.
The Merseysiders made four new signings in the same window, with Dominik Szoboszlai, Ryan Gravenberch, Alexis Mac Allister and Wataru Endo joining for more than £140million.
Liverpool’s overall revenue increased from £594million to a club-record high of £614million in 2023-24, having secured a third-place finish in the Premier League in Jurgen Klopp’s final season at Anfield.
Liverpool wage bill increased without Champions League football
Borson revealed the club typically pay around 70 per cent of their overall wage bill to their first-team players.
He told Football Insider: “It’s quite hard to understand how the wages have gone up, especially because last season was a non-Champions League season.
“If you take the headline reported wages in their accounts, Liverpool has for the last few years always been very high.
“The only indication of how that breaks down is around the wage split we had from Uefa last year.
“They accidentally leaked out the percentage spend on player wages and Liverpool in 2022-23 was around 71 per cent, which is about average.
“That means 70 per cent of the total wages was on the first team.
“If you were to do that in terms of the numbers that have just gone, that would mean that their wage bill in terms of the squad was around £267million, with the rest in administration and other functions.
“It is a very big number, £267million on player wages.
“You would imagine it was a similar sort of percentage last season.”
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