By Mark Baber
January 13 – Plans by the Premier League to rebrand their logo by removing the lion, as soon as their lucrative sponsorship deal with Barclays Bank comes to an end, have been compared by fans on Twitter to the death the well-loved Zimbabwean lion Cecil.
By David Owen
January 8 – Rising payroll costs were partly responsible for pushing Chelsea back into the red last season, new figures have shown. The Chelsea FC company accounts for the year to 30 June 2015 put aggregate payroll costs at £215.6 million, up from £190.6 million, an increase of 13%.
By Paul Nicholson
January 7 – With the last evidence in the Hillsborough disaster inquest being heard earlier this week, the Hillsborough Family Support Group (HFSG) announced another step forward for families and fans of Liverpool, saying that that Friday April 15 will be the last Hillsborough Memorial service held at Anfield Stadium.
By Paul Nicholson
January 4 – The Premier League’s Christmas and New Year extravaganza of three matches in 10 days saw more than 1.16 million fans attend matches with just 37,444 seats unfilled across the 30 home games, of which more than 10,000 of the unfilled seats were at Sunderland’s Stadium of Light.
By David Owen
December 30 – Wilfried Bony and Ben Davies ensured that Swansea City stayed in the black in 2014-15, in spite of a pronounced increase in costs. Transfer fees agreed on their departures for Manchester City and Tottenham Hotspur respectively were enough to convert an operating loss into a pre-tax profit of £1.7 million compared with £1.3 million in 2013-14.
December 29 – Boxing Day fixtures saw nine out of 10 Premier League home clubs report stadiums over 95% full with the day’s average attendance coming in at 97.1%. Swansea and Chelsea both reported being at over 99% capacity.
By Mark Baber
December 23 – An independent commission set up after former Vitesse Arnhem owner Merab Jordania claimed Chelsea influenced policy at the club has cleared the two clubs of having an improper relationship, according to an announcement of the KNVB.
By Paul Nicholson
December 22 – English High Street retailers wondering where their shoppers were on the last weekend before Christmas will find a good bulk of them were at Premier League football grounds. Out of more than 400,000 seats available for round 17 fixtures, just 8,976 were unfilled in what is proving to be a bumper season for attendances.
By Andrew Warshaw
December 18 – After the most staggering capitulation in the history of the Premier League, never has the phrase ‘The Special One’ sounded so hollow.
By Mark Baber
December 18 – Tottenham Hotspur have had their plans for a new £400 million stadium approved by Haringey Council paving the way, subject to the Mayor Boris Johnson’s permission, for work to begin on a modern 61,000 seater stadium in spring 2016.
December 18 – More American money is joining the Premier League ownership roster with Josh Harris and David Blitzer, owners of NBA’s Philadelphia 76ers and the NHL’s New Jersey Devils, spending $100 million to buy a controlling stake in south-east London club.Crystal Palace.
December 17 – Manchester United have continued their live event format in India with the addition of two new event days in Bangalore and Mumbai.
December 16 – Pre-Christmas Premier League attendances are holding up well with eight of last weekend’s home clubs reporting over 90% capacity and three of them over 99%. But of 20,795 unfilled seats in round 16 out of a total of 361,222 available, 14,514 were at Aston Villa and Sunderland.
By Paul Nicholson
December 10 – Christmas is coming early for the Premier League clubs in terms of attendances. With more than 400,000 tickets available for the last weekend of Premier League fixtures, just 14,190 seats were left unfilled.
December 4 – Liverpool under new German manager Jurgen Klopp are starting to look sharp. Wednesday night they slammed six goals past Southampton to book a place in the League Cup semi-final against Stoke.