Physios on £191k and goalkeeper coaches on £175k: The staggering finances of Sheffield Wednesday's division revealed by leaked EFL survey

And as the division attempts to handle the pulling of the matchday rug in finance terms, a recent study has laid bare just how incredible spending has become in the second tier.

Up-to-date accounts for Sheffield Wednesday are yet to be published after a Government deadline originally set for the end of this month was put back until the end of July due to the obstruction to business posed by the coronavirus.

Wednesday are understood to be one of the clubs spending well more than their total income on staff costs – 168 per cent according to their 2017/18 accounts – though this figure is expected to have reduced due to players outgoings last summer.

But it’s a broad picture across the division. Last year Reading spent 229 per cent of its income on player wages. Over the past five seasons, Championship clubs have generated £3.03bn income. Wages in the same period? £3.13 billion.

But an eye-watering survey into the scale of that spending has shone a closer light on where that cash is going. And it’s not just on players.

A survey carried out by the EFL across the football league uncovered that one Championship club pays their ‘head of IT’ a staggering £115,000 a year, for example. A Championship kit man is paid a salary of £56,000.

The findings of the survey were not meant for public reading – the Daily Mail presented the leak and chose to protect clubs anonymity – and it is not known whether any of the examples offered are those handed over by Sheffield Wednesday.

The highest-paid Championship manager is paid an eye-watering £3.46m per year – over £66,000 per week – a long way over the division’s average of just over £16,880 per week. Assistant management seems to be a lucrative business, too, with one right-hand-man receiving a whopping £812,496 (£15,625).

The report shows that one southern second-tier club pays its sports science chief £100,000 per year. The average salary for that role comes out at £35,000. A first-team coach in the division is paid £200,000, one goalkeeper coach a staggering £175,000.

The disparity between the spending on player wages between League One and the Championship is laid bare, too. The average weekly wage in Wednesday’s league is £29,000 while clubs a league below pay their players an average of just £4,753 – it’s perhaps easy to see why so many clubs struggle after promotion.

It’s the spending rat race with a place in the Premier League at the end of the maze, with parachute payments said to be the piece of cheese at the end of it.

There’s an incredible difference in TV money for those playing in the top tier. Huddersfield Town, relegated as the bottom-placed club last season, received £104.31m in broadcast payments for that season alone. Leeds United, the doyenne of Sky Sports’ Championship coverage, received £9.14m.