Monday, 26 March 2007

CHELSEA AND MANCHESTER UNITED are the unrivalled 'Big Two' in the Barclays Premiership this season, but when it comes to giving money to charity, neither has their shooting boots on.

Based on their rankings in the intelligentgiving.com Premiership Giving League, Manchester United would be struggling to make the UEFA Cup places (£62,843 donated) while Chelsea (£7,000) are in real danger of getting sucked into a relegation battle.

Neill Ghosh, intelligentgiving.com Lead Researcher said: “While football clubs may say they do a lot for their local communities, the amount of hard cash they give to charity each year is staggeringly low, with big clubs like Chelsea and Manchester United among the worst offenders. Surely the likes of Roman Abramovich could afford to give more.”

But it is not just the Big Two who are under-performing. Across the board, Premiership football clubs give very little to charity each year in terms of cash donations. In fact, according to their annual reports, nine give nothing at all. The total given by all the Premiership clubs would barely cover three weeks' wages for Chelsea striker Andrei Shevchenko.

Ghosh said: “With Premier League clubs turning over more than £1 billion a year, these figures smack of an industry more interested in pandering to the bling-laden lifestyles of its workforce than in giving money to charity.”

> Download the Premiership Giving League (PDF, 50K)
> Our article: Football's Big Guns Caught Offside