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Real Madrid topped the football 'Rich List' again but they still have large debts

For the first time since the Money League started in 1998, a club has generated more than €400m in revenue, with the Spanish giants increasing their income by around 10% last season to hit the €401m mark.

Just how much the financial landscape of European club football has changed, and is still changing, can be gauged by the fact that Manchester United topped the League a decade ago with income of £117m, which was then approximately €195m as the euro was not yet in circulation.

Hot on Real's heels this year, just as they currently are in La Liga, are Barcelona. The Catalan club's Champions League triumph and domestic double last season helped them leapfrog United, who slip to third after being in second place for the last two years.

However, the figures, as Deloitte openly admit, only tell one side of the story.

- there is no other word for it - that United have created for themselves have resonated around the world.

There is considerable money going into the coffers at Old Trafford - they remain one of the world's most popular clubs after all - but it is going out just as rapidly in interest payments on the debts. Without the sale of Cristiano Ronaldo last summer, United would have actually made a trading loss.

United's predicament was certainly well-noted in this part of the world when the scale of their financial difficulties became known in January.

There were plenty of smug headlines about how Spanish clubs had their own home-grown presidents, rather than foreign owners, to thank for their financial stability, conveniently forgetting that several smaller Spanish clubs have gone to the wall in the last 20 years, most notably Malaga and Burgos in the early 1990s.

When Uefa published figures last month that showed 56% of the debts of European clubs belong to the Premier League's 20 teams, plenty of commentators in Spain and Italy were quick to pontificate that English clubs had only themselves to blame for falling into foreign hands.

Some even went as far as to predict that the prominence, if not dominance, of Premier League clubs in the Champions League was soon going to come to an end.

However, the truth is that Real Madrid's financial situation - and that of many other big Spanish clubs, notably Atletico Madrid and Valencia - is scarcely much better than United's, regardless of the gloss Florentino Perez may put on it.

Sources in Spain disagree on how much Real actually owe.

Perez stated at the start of the season that , a figure he admitted to when he presented his budget for this season.

However, other analysts, who have done a bit of digging through the accounts and talked to banking figures, think .

Whatever view you take, these are big, big numbers.

Back in 2001, during his first stint as president, in the centre of Madrid to clear the club's debts that had been built up by his two predecessors, Ramon Mendoza and Lorenzo Sanz.

The joke going around then was that even though Real Madrid had been technically bankrupt for the best part of a decade, no Spanish bank would ever dare to foreclose on such a national institution and risk such public shame.

However, this was an era when the Spanish economy was buoyant. Now it's in crisis, and the financial institutions here have developed a very different attitude to that which prevailed before.

Profound questions remain, such as how Real's latest debt burden was accumulated - leaving last summer's €260m buying spree to one side for the moment - and is Perez's forecast of how he is going to pay it off realistic.

Real fans, financial rather than footballing, think it is. Others are less convinced, pointing out that a consistent 10% annual growth in income just isn't going to happen in the current climate.

Of course, Spanish clubs aren't alone in being in murky financial waters. Italian clubs are mired in debt as well. Perhaps not to the same scale as Spain or England, but the debts are still there.

Marius Stankevicius has been one of the better winter transfer window signings by a La Liga club

financially compared to its two biggest European rivals. But given the sorry history of Italian football clubs cooking the books, it would be naive to think they are significantly better off.

The European Club Association, which brings together leading clubs from across the continent, last week agreed with Uefa that clubs must soon present balanced accounts. But - from 2012 to 2015 - may just be an invitation for some teams to continue living on the never-never.

In my local Madrid watering hole, which I usually refer to as 'my other office', a sweepstake is under way among friends that resembles aspects of the plot of the Dirty Harry movie , in which participants in a game try to predict certain celebrity deaths.

In this case, we are trying to predict which big European club will go to the wall first, and it may not necessarily be an English one.

Q) As a massive Holland fan, I can't understand why doesn't seem to get any game time for Real Madrid.
Joshua de Kooke, Guernsey

A) There was talk that Drenthe was going to be sold last summer in the clear-out that followed Florentino Perez's arrival as the Real president.

Milan and Fiorentina were the clubs most regularly mentioned. However, Drenthe made it clear that, despite his frustration at only playing in roughly half of Real's games over the previous two seasons and usually coming on as a late replacement, he was going to stay and fight for a place.

The fact is that Drenthe, despite his speed, seems to have lost out to Marcelo in the contest to become Pellegrini's first choice on the left flank, although he's done well when drafted in as an emergency left-back.

I can only speculate why this is but I don't think that Drenthe is quite as creative as Marcelo. I would imagine that he might be looking for a move this coming summer.

Q) What do you think about my fellow countryman, and Sevilla loanee from Sampdoria, ?
Laurynas Lipnickas, Hull but originally from Lithuania

A) Stankevicius has probably been one of the better winter transfer window signings by a La Liga club.

He looks good at right-back and at 1.90m he's been a threat in set-piece positions, although he has yet to score a league goal. He's also got a good long-range shot, as seen a couple of times in the Champions League tie against CSKA Moscow.

However, he did have a few problems when moved inside to the centre of defence against Real Madrid on Saturday. Sevilla coach Manolo Jimenez appears to have a lot of confidence in him as he has started all eight La Liga games that he has been available for.

I also think there is a good chance that the loan deal may become a permanent move in the summer.