The sports daily L'Equipe publishes its annual study on player compensation on Friday. A ranking that makes a lot of talk every year as certain figures make you dizzy. However, they reveal great disparities between the teams. The stratospheric Lionel Messi, playing at FC Barcelona, is almost out of competition: the Argentinian player earns more than eight million euros per month. In league 1, it is unsurprisingly Paris Saint-Germain which trusts the first places. Thus, his Brazilian star Neymar receives a pharaonic gross salary of 36 million euros per year. A figure equivalent to the budget of clubs like Nîmes, Brest or Amiens. Please note that this figure does not take into account advertising revenues and amounts paid by sponsors.
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The first eleven of the ranking are Parisian
Behind the untouchable Brazilian striker, bridgehead of the globalized PSG, we find the French Kylian Mbappé and his 20 million euros gross annual. The first eleven players in the ranking all play at PSG. Eight of them earn more than a million euros a month, which is an exception in Europe.
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In the rest of the ranking, we find Monaco which places three players in the top 20 and Marseille which places two. Kevin Strootman is undoubtedly the player with the lowest return despite emoluments estimated at 500,000 euros monthly. On average, a Ligue 1 player earns 35,000 euros gross per month. Reims has the lowest average salary: 25,000 euros. However, this does not prevent the Champenois from appearing in seventh place in the French championship. Money doesn't always rank.