Man United pay rockets

Manchester United's payroll has soared by 40 per cent - and the club is paying its players a total of £1.3 million a week.

Official figures released this morning show that the world's richest club paid out a total of £34million in salaries in only six months, taking Premiership spending to an astonishing new high.

If United win the Premiership or the European Champions League, bonuses could send the wage bill soaring even further. The implications for other clubs are frightening since, if they want to be able to compete with United in attracting the best players, they will be forced to try to match the spending levels.

The £34 million total for the last six months represents an increase of £9.5 million on the previous half season. It comes after international stars Juan Veron and Ruud van Nistelrooy joined the Old Trafford payroll on a minimum of £50,000 a week.

David Beckham is said to be on the brink of signing a deal that could earn him at least £100,000 a week, while captain Roy Keane has recently secured one paying him at least £80,000 a week. The increase was well in excess of the 25 per cent to 30 per cent budgeted rise that chief executive Peter Kenyon had signalled earlier in the season.

Yet despite the massive rise in salaries, the club continues to make money. Almost unique in world football, United reported an 80 per cent leap in pre-tax profits to £30.9 million in the six months to 31 January.

Part of that will have included £16million profit on the sales of Jaap Stam, Andy Cole and Jonathan Greening. But the club also broke the British transfer record twice with the purchase of Veron and Van Nistelrooy for a total of £47 million, further underlining the gulf between them and their rivals. The figures come as leading stockmarket quoted rivals Leeds and Newcastle both reported first half losses.

Even before the effects of playing trading, on an underlying operational basis United remains in rude health. Total revenues lifted 14 per cent to £81million as the new three-year Premier League television contract pushed up media income by 60 per cent to £24 million.

At the gate all 17 home games - 13 league and four European - were sold out increasing receipts by 11 per cent to £31 million.

Conference and catering revenues at £5 million and sponsorship income at £11 million also showed increases during the year.

The one black mark was a 30 per cent slide in merchandising income to £9 million though the club said that was because it had been deliberately scaling down operations ahead of the Nike sponsorship contract kicking in from this summer.

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