English Premier League football club Liverpool has highlighted the financial benefits of its redeveloped Anfield stadium, adding that it is continuing to assess future development options for its Anfield Road stand.
Liverpool has pointed to an expanded capacity at Anfield and an increase in media rights revenue as the key reasons behind a year-on-year rise in revenue and profit for 2017.
Overall revenue for the year ending May 31, 2017 amounted to £364m (€411.4m/$500.9m) – a significant increase on the £62m that was posted in the previous year.
Profit after tax turned around from a loss of £21m in 2016 to a positive figure of £39m in the past year, while cash generated from operations almost doubled from £37m to £71m.
It was in this financial period that Liverpool opened its expanded Main Stand, which saw an increase in Anfield’s capacity to 54,074. Despite not playing in European competitions during this financial period, matchday revenue increased by £12m to £74m mainly as a result in increased hospitality sales.
Andy Hughes, chief operating officer at Liverpool, said: “Our recent capital projects which include the Main Stand, the new retail store, the combined training ground and the new pitch at Anfield will be close to £200m which further demonstrates the commitment from this ownership.
“We continue to work up design, capacity and economic viability options for Anfield Road working with an architect to help with that process. This follows the same comprehensive process we followed with the Main Stand expansion.”
Image: Robert Cutts
