Sheffield Wednesday’s wages halved and turnover increased as latest accounts released

The Owls’ wage bill was always going to fall off a cliff in this round of accounts, which were put on Companies House this evening, given that they are the first that take into account their first season in League One, with a host of players on big wages leaving and those that did say having theirs decreased via relegation clauses.

With that in mind the accounts for 2022 show that the club’s wages dropped from £21.1m in 2021 to £10.9m without social security and pension costs, while player registrations amortisation - a process of gradually writing off the initial cost of a player over the course of their contract – in the operating loss section fell from £4.7m to just £750,000.

There was more good news elsewhere in the document as it was revealed that turnover had increased by almost £5m from £11.6m in 2021 to £16.4m in 2022, with ‘match receipts and associated’ counting for almost £10m of that total amount.

Wednesday did still make a loss, as is the case with so many football clubs around the world, but the size of that loss decreased hugely from £25.8m to only £7.3m, that’s around £18.5m better off in 2022 than they were the previous year.

The Star will bring more in-depth coverage of the Owls’ accounts tomorrow, which will include an interview with a sports finance expert to break things down further.