Hammers wage bill soars 12 per cent
And the 12% increase is likely to bring West Ham over the initial Financial Fair Play wage cap of £52m set for last season.
The £63.88m figure includes National Insurance and pensions costs for all 609 Hammers employees but the majority of these are part time staff and the vast majority of the money is thought to go to the 100 players and backroom staff employed on the football side of the club.
Two seasons ago the club’s commercial revenue grew from £7.9m to £13.9m and retail sales grew from £4.8m to £6m giving West Ham another £7.2m to spend last season so that pushed our maximum wage cap up to £61.2m.
The set of financial accounts published at companies house this week show commercial revenue and retail sales grew very slightly last season meaning our Financial Fair Play for this season will be restricted to around £57m, the sale of Mo Diame is believed to have bumped that up to just over the £60m mark but we will need to be prudent with the wage bill to stay within the rules.