Welcome to issue #087 of Contemporary Football, your inside look at how the game really works behind the scenes.
Monday to Friday, you’ll uncover a new perspective on football business, and sometimes a deeper story that sharpens your thinking and gives you an edge in the beautiful game.
If you need support on your football journey, just write me.
Most people will see one number.
€22 million loss.
And conclude: something went wrong.
But if you stop there, you miss the point.
When football is the family business
SSC Napoli is not owned like most clubs.
For the De Laurentiis family, football is not one asset among many.
It is the business.
Around 90% of the holding’s revenues come from Napoli.
Cinema, the original activity, is now almost irrelevant (5-7%).
This changes the rules.
There is no external business covering mistakes.
Every decision on the pitch hits the P&L.
What this forces you to do
When football is your main business, you don’t have the luxury of confusion.
You need a model.
Napoli’s model?
Control costs.
Stay disciplined on wages (4th in Serie A).
Use the transfer market as a profit engine.
Avoid dependency on external capital.
This is why Napoli has been competitive for years without spending like the top clubs.
How they actually compete
Napoli doesn’t try to win auctions.
It plays a different game.
Buy before the player is obvious (Kvara, Kim, Koulibaly).
Sell when the market peaks.
Accept that the squad will change.
From the outside, it looks like instability.
From the inside, it’s capital rotation.
The club protects the system, not individual players.
Then comes the stress test
Sometimes a season breaks the pattern.
For example, when there is no European competition.
It means lower revenues.
And at the same time, you have:
A high-cost coach like Antonio Conte, the highest-paid in Italy.
A squad built to meet those expectations.
This happened in 24/25, and here are the numbers:
Revenues drop to €338m (−9%).
TV rights down 45%.
Matchday down 13%.
Costs rise to €365m (+24%):
+€26m in wages.
+€41m in amortisation.
Napoli closes around −€21m.
SSC Bari (also under the same umbrella) adds another −€6m.
The holding turns negative.
Here’s the key insight
This is not a broken model.
It’s a model under pressure.
And that’s exactly why it’s useful to study.
Because you see the cause and effect in real time.
Spend more → margins disappear
Miss Europe → revenues collapse
Push for short-term results → flexibility reduces
What most clubs hide
Many owners can absorb losses.
Different businesses.
Different cash flows.
Different priorities.
Napoli can’t.
So it behaves differently.
Faster decisions.
Less sentiment.
Shorter cycles.
When something doesn’t work, it gets corrected.
What people get wrong
Fans often read these moves as inconsistency.
Selling too early.
Changing direction.
Not building long-term dynasties.
But that’s not the objective.
Napoli is not optimised for continuity.
It is optimised for growth on its own cash flow.
There is one clear gap.
Infrastructure.
Stadium. Facilities. Long-term assets.
Napoli has built a strong operating machine.
It hasn’t fully locked in the asset side yet.
Why this matters
If you strip football down to its fundamentals, one question remains:
Can your club sustain itself?
Napoli is one of the few clubs where the answer is tested every season.
Not in theory.
In cash.
If your club had no owner support, no external business, no safety net…
Would it still be competitive?
That’s all for today!
Federico