World's most paid footballers for 2023

The football world this year was marked by huge Saudi contracts and large names in the American football league. However, a small section of stars including Cristiano Ronaldon, Lionel Messin and Neymar kept their position at the top of the financial list.

To convince the Brazilian man to replace the first French league with the Saudi, Al Hillal's club had to pay a royal prize. The 31-year-old Brazilian reportedly has received a villa with staff, a series of luxury cars, access to a private plane, as well as awards for victories and posts on social media. In addition, he received permission to live with his girlfriend, who is restricted by Islamic law. All of this, along with about 80 million dollars in compensation (112 million in total income).

Al Hillal can handle it. It is one of four clubs the Saudi Public Investment Fund took over in June and is key to Saudi Arabia's astronomical sports ambitions. The country wants to trigger an earthquake in world football and become a new destination for the best talents. Saudis are not ashamed to spend extraordinary sums of money on stars.

In this year's summer transfer, Deloitte reports, Saudi clubs spent a little less than a billion dollars on 94 foreign players. This amount does not include the staggering amounts offered to players who have refused to leave their European clubs, including the $1.1 billion package for Kylian Mbarpaen in just one year or three-year contract worth $1.6 billion, which was offered to Lionel Messi, which still decided to send his talent to Florida.

It is estimated that the world's top 11 football players will earn $995m in front of the agents' taxes and payments this season, and five of them will earn nine-dollar sums. Compared to last year, when ten football players won a record $662 million total record, that is an increase of 53 percent. Saudi Pro League players take four positions in Forbes' rankings, and their total profits spend half the money for the entire year, mainly because of lucrative game contracts.

Cristiano Ronaldo, who was the first on the list of paid football players in 2021, is back in first place, with an expected $260 million in return. His decision to move to Al Nasr, Saudi Arabia, earlier this year, after his severe division with Manchester United caused an ecstasy toward the Kingdom. Ronaldo is projected to win 200 million in the field, but his agreement is believed to include a fee to play, as well as financial incentives from commercial agreements run by the club. And while Al Nasr is likely to buy some of the character's rights, Ronaldo still holds a rich advertising portfolio (including Nike and Jacob&Co), earning another $60 million a year.

Saudis are extremely untransparent about their business activities, especially when it comes to seemingly irrational sums. Forbes spoke with more than 10 interior industry people to meet the assessments, and there is a strong consensus that some public reports on football salaries may be inflated. It is possible that the reason for this is an attempt to ease the damage to the reputation of playing in a country that is regularly accused of using sports to turn attention away from human rights violations. Another explanation is that astronomical wages are used to attract even more players to play in the weakest race in Saudi Arabia.

At present, Saudi Arabia can write whatever checks it wants, thanks to its large financial resources. At the same time, regulations in Europe prevent clubs from spending more than they earn, meaning that the five major European leagues cannot compete on equal grounds with Saudis. Of course, many players leave for Saudi Arabia at the end of their career, which means that maintaining the interest in the league will require a certain amount of creativity.

Everyone is still following Ronaldo, Benzema and all those good players”, Rossi Bidle, owner of the sports marketing firm XtraTime FC, said. But those guys are only gonna play for another few years, then what? Will the players go back to major European clubs and take over? Or will we soon see contracts like that of Mess?

To attract 36-year-old Argentinian legend to the American football league, Inter Miami reportedly agreed with him on a share of the profits from the Adidas and Apple TV league partners, as well as an option to buy a stake in Inter Miami when Argentinasi retires. Along with its annual income outside the 70 million-dollar field, which grew up after Argentina's World Cup victory and its U.S. movement, Messie will earn a total of $135m in 1923, making him the first MLS player to end up in ball 10 since David Beckham, who managed to do it in 2012.

Of course, the Messi and the players of Saudi Arabia, Benzema of Al Ittihad (106 million dollars) and Sadio Mane of Al Nasr (52 million dollars) are not the only ones who collect super large checks. Mbppe, who fell from last year's first place to fourth place this year, leads the players from Europe with about $120m in profits. Three Premier League players are on the list, including the friends of Manchester City team Erling Haaland (58 million dollars) and Kevin De Bruyne (39 million dollars), and Mohammed Salah of Liverpool (53 million dollars). Harry Kane, in his first season in Bayern Munich, and Robert Leandowski of Barcelona ends Top 11, with total profits projected at $36m and $34m, respectively.