Newcastle United part ways with major sponsor as commercial revenues rocket boosted by Champions League

FUN88 have now said their goodbyes to Newcastle United.

The betting firm will no longer be a feature on the shirts at St James’ Park home matches.

That very final SJP game was the 0-0 against Leicester City.

For that game, FUN88 placed an advert in the official match programme, which included:

“As the season draws to a pulsating finale, we wanted to extend our best wishes to you, the heartbeat of this great institution, the Newcastle United fans.

“It’s been the most thrilling campaign since our partnership began and we’ve loved being on the terraces with you every week just as much as we enjoy our interactions with you on social media every day.

“Our relationship with you and your great club is something we all treasure immensely.”

We already knew that the Newcastle United owners had successfully bought themselves out of a shockingly low value long-term deal with FUN88 that Mike Ashley had tied them into, now the betting company giving their final farewells.

The new sponsor will pay many times more for the privilege of having their branding on the NUFC shirt.

A new sponsorship has been agreed and now we are just waiting for the public unveiling.

The new shirt sponsor deal will already be worth a lot more than the initial fee already agreed, as such agreements are pretty much always usually tied in with incentives based on success and increased exposure for the sponsor(s).

Such as what you get from qualifying for the Champions League…

As well as the stunning results Eddie Howe and his team have delivered on the pitch, we are set to see similar stunning improved results off it. Financial results which of course have been massively assisted by Eddie and his players.

As well as the significantly increased shirt sponsor cash, Newcastle United set to see other revenue streams move up by a number of levels.

With Newcastle United now guaranteed a top four place, that will guarantee around a £35m increase compared to last season, purely cash linked to how many times you are on live TV in the UK and the final league position, worth millions extra for each place higher.

You then have what must be also significantly higher amounts of cash that will be realised this season, when it comes to any number of run of the mill areas, whether it is ticket sales, replica shirt sales, sales of other official merchandise, pies and pints, corporate cash and so on.

So many fans had refused to pay Mike Ashley any more money if possible, with the now previous owner even ending up having to give 10,000+ free season tickets away, after thousands and thousands of loyal NUFC fans made a massive sacrifice to force him out, by boycotting and giving up their season tickets and in many cases hundreds of loyalty points that guaranteed away tickets and tickets for cup finals etc. Sadly, many thousands of those NUFC fans now locked out and having to try and get tickets game by game, as well as having lost out on tickets for this season’s Wembley visit.

On a happier note, Newcastle United now back in Europe and not only that, it is the Champions League!

This will guarantee at least £50m directly from participation BUT that could be a whole lot more due to how it will help them increase commercial revenues, PLUS if Newcastle United advanced into the knockout stages of the Champions League, that would also seriously increase the revenues further.

All in all, Newcastle United look set to be increasing their revenues / turnover by more than 50% compared to last season, with far far more to come if continuing their success on and off the pitch.

As for those clubs who have become used to taking for granted Champions League level revenues… it is also going to be VERY interesting to see how they manage their finances moving forward, if denied regular access to those kinds of revenues in the future.