Measuring and Monitoring Sustainability in Listed European Football Clubs: A Value-Added Reporting Perspective

Abstract

All sports have their roots and connection in some way to the Olympic spirit, and therefore fall within the vision and mission of the Olympic Committee, which has a central aim of “building a better world”. This is a fundamental value of the Olympics and sustainability is a “working principle” of this. This research analyses the performance of professional European football teams that are publicly listed on stock markets, analysing their income statements and factoring in how the value-added perspective is impacting professional sport. The methodology we use considers the sustainable contribution of the distribution of added value. The Value-Added Statement is considered as a part of broader Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), which can be traced back as a concept to the late 1970s. It is still in widespread use and is regarded as being both a credible and a tested measure. In this paper, the authors apply a slightly modified and simplified version of this value-added approach to all publicly listed European football clubs and use these as a proxy for wider professional sport. This research demonstrates that, although most professional sports clubs are profit-oriented, the distribution of wealth generated by the added value is unbalanced. In most cases, at least in financial terms, the data shows shareholders are the most disadvantaged, whereas athletes are the most rewarded.