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Tottenham Hotspur release financials; you probably don't understand them

Spurs lost money last season, but that's certainly not anything to be concerned about. The club is in a financially stable position.

Michael Regan

The above headline is not meant to be condescending, because I don't understand them. I am not sure what Tottenham Hotspur considers to be operational expenses, or non-operational expenses. But, here goes.

Tottenham Hotspur posted an "operating loss after football trading" of £1.6m during their year ending June 30, 2012, and a loss for the year of £4.3m after interest and tax. Last season, the team made a profit of just under a million pounds. They made a profit from operations of £23m, which is down from last year's £38m. This is directly attributable to the loss of Champions League football.

What does this mean? Basically, that Tottenham Hotspur are financially stable, but unable to spend huge on wages and transfer fees while making a profit in their current state -- that is, a non-Champions League side that plays at White Hart Lane. A run of Champions League appearances and a new stadium likely changes things considerably.

It's also worth noting that the club's maintenance costs on the new training facility will be significantly lower than the cost of building the thing in the first place, and the costs incurred by building the facility probably counted as non-operations expenses over the last couple of years.

The club says that they are in line to comply with UEFA's Financial Fair Play regulations, which makes sense. FFP isn't about keeping clubs from incurring debts and running a few years of losses while they do things like build stadiums and training facilities.

For good measure, here's Daniel Levy's statement about the club's finances and future:

"We are ever ambitious for the Club, driving all areas of the business and our focus continues to be the delivery of an increased capacity stadium. There is much work to be done refining the detailed design and resolving the final development issues. We intend to deliver this to the same high standards of the new Training Centre and to reward our incredibly loyal supporters with a world class stadium and one that will have made a crucial contribution to the regeneration of a priority borough in London."