With today’s confirmation that Zlatan Ibrahimovic has moved from AC Milan to Paris St-Germain here is a list of the top ten highest paid footballers in the world. Note that these numbers reflect club wages, and doesn’t include any taxes that some teams pay on behalf of their players:
- Samuel Eto’o (Anzhi) €20m
- Cristiano Ronaldo (Real Madrid) €13m
- Didier Drogba (Shangai Shenua) €13m
- Zltan Ibrahimovic (PSG) €13m
- Lionel Messi (Barcelona) €12m
- Waybe Rooney (Manchester United) €11.5m
- Yaya Tourè (Manchester City) €10.8m
- Dario Conca (Guanghzou Evergrande) €10.5m
- Bastian Schweinsteiger (Bayern Munich) €9.7m
- Kakà (Real Madrid) €9m
Two things that jump out at me from the list. One is that no player from Serie A made the list. Italian football is really struggling financially and that can be see in their inability to attract the top talent in the game.
Second, is the movement east of players. The highest paid player plays in Russia and two of the top eight play in China. Football is really a global sport, and stars are realizing that they don’t need to move to the traditional European teams and leagues in order to make high wages.
