Zenit Football Club

FC Zenit is a Russian football club from St. Petersburg, playing in the Russian championship . It was founded in May 1925 as a team at the Stalin Leningrad Metal Plant. Since 1936, the club bore the name "Stalinets," and four years later it acquired its current name.

Zenit is the only team in the Premier League representing St. Petersburg.

As of July 2016, Zenit has 17 trophies: Champions Cup (1984, 2007, 2010, 2012, 2015), National Cup (1944, 1999, 2010, 2016) and Super Cup (1985, 2008, 2011, 2015, 2016), Premier League Cup (2003), UEFA Cup and UEFA Super Cup (both 2008).

Performance indicators

2024: Zenit's budget turned out to be the largest among the football clubs of the Russian Premier League - 17 billion rubles

On September 30, 2024, it became known that the budget of the Zenit football club for the current season will amount to ₽17 billion, which is a record figure among all sports clubs in Russia. This amount exceeds the club's planned expenses last season by ₽1 - ₽2 billion.

According to RBC, sources familiar with the planning of the budget of the current champions of Russia note that this amount may increase in the event of additional spending on infrastructure or transfers. Last season (2023), Zenit's budget amounted to almost ₽16 billion, which was already the highest in the Russian Premier League (RPL).

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Freepik

The closest pursuer of the St. Petersburg club in terms of budget in 2023 was Spartak with more than ₽10 billion. Sources in the RPL leadership confirm that Zenit will retain its leadership in this indicator this season.

Up to 60% of the club's revenues are sponsorship contracts, television rights, prize and advertising revenues, including from cooperation with Gazprom, Gazprom Neft, Gazprombank and other large partners. The club plans to receive the rest of the funds from the sale of tickets, player transfers, the sale of club attributes and investments in the stadium.

The commercial department of Zenit is tasked with increasing the club's revenues by at least 10%, primarily by attracting new sponsors and selling tickets. At the same time, the club does not establish a clear budget for transfers, all major transactions will be discussed by the board of directors.

Zenit intends to continue its transfer policy focused on finding the strongest players in Russia, Europe and Latin America. The club is also the most visited in Eastern Europe at the start of the 2024/25 season.^[1]

2019: €180m

In 2019, Barcelona became the first club to pass the €800 million annual revenue mark. Catalans for the year increased revenue from €690 million to €840 million.

Football club revenues for the 2019/19 season

In the top 20 most profitable football clubs in the world there are 2 newcomers compared to last year: Lyon (€220 million - 17th place) and Napoli (€207 million - 20th place)

Key for clubs remains the proceeds from the sale of rights to show tournaments (broadcasting).

Zenit got into the top 30 with revenue of €180 million. The St. Petersburg-based club finished 28th between Eintracht Frankfurt and Porto.

Notes