Express & Star

Manchester City accounts from 1934 found in a box in CANNOCK

Manchester City's financial accounts from more than 90 years ago have been found at a house in Staffordshire.

Published

The accounts for the 1924/25 season through to the 1934/35 season were found at the back of an Edwardian writing slope in a house in Cannock.

Taken from Manchester City Annual General Meetings, the collection of accounts was owned by a former shareholder of Manchester City Football Club in the 1920's and 30's. Noting everything from players wages to gate receipts, liabilities to assets, these reports account for every penny spent and received by the club during the entirety of the football season. The receipts date from 1924 and from the twelve in total in this collection, they date as late as the 1934-35 season.

They make for interesting reading with the club, a mid-table first division side, spending £5,492 18s 6d on transfers in 1924/25. This summer the club, under the new management of Spaniard Pep Guardiola, spent more than £170 million. In total Premier League clubs spent more than £1.1 billion.

More of the Manchester City documents

The accounts also reveal the wages paid to the club's top players nine decades ago.

They show the First Division club paid £10,321 to its players in wages for the year - the equivalent of £309,320 today. City's wage bill for the 2015-16 season was £196million.

In 1924 the Lancashire club had 23 players on its books, each earning an average salary of £450 ? £13,500 today. Yaya Toure and Sergio Aguero, meanwhile, are currently on £220,000 per week at City.

The accounts are going under auction on Monday November 28, where they are expected to fetch £300.

Charles Hanson, the director of Hansons Auctioneers who is auctioning off the papers, said: "It's a fantastic collection of Reports and Balance Sheets dating back as early as 1924 and we are looking forward to selling an exciting, rare piece of Manchester City history, a set of reports rarely seen or talked about considering the money that is thrown around football in the 21st century."

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