BLACKBURN Rovers' 1994-95 championship season saw the club enjoy a greater rise in income than anyone else, reveals the 1996 Deloitte & Touche Annual Review of Football Finance.

It grew by a massive 103 per cent, to £14.1 million, including a 118 per cent rise in commercial income.

The report reveals that the profits gap between the Premier League and the remaining divisions is widening.

"Premier League clubs now have the lion's share of football's income, £323 million out of a total of £468 million (69 per cent)," said Gerry Boon, head of the Deloitte & Touche football industry team.

"To put it into perspective, Manchester United and Newcastle United together have a greater turnover than the whole of Division One."

The gap is also expected to become wider with increasing Premier League attendances and new TV deals.

Rovers were also highly placed in another table during 1994-95.

Wages and salaries during the title campaign took 65 per cent of the club's turnover.

While Manchester United actually paid out several more million than Rovers, it represented only 21 per cent of Old Trafford's massive income. At the other end of the scale, relegated Ipswich paid wages totalling less than half Rovers' £9.2 million but it represented 78 per cent of their turnover.

And there is a warning that controlling the wage bill is football's greatest challenge.

"It's a bigger challenge every year," said Boon.

"To put that in context, in each division of the Football League, players' wages were more than the total income from gate receipts and season tickets."

Interestingly, the report points out that gate receipts and season-ticket income now accounts for just 42 per cent of football's total income.

"With the average Premier League club now having a turnover almost four times that of the average Division One club it is difficult to see how even the larger Football League clubs are going to bridge the gap with the Premier League and sustain it," added Bond.

While the Premier League rakes in the big money, Boon added: "The losses of the Football League clubs generally are a cause for concern, exacerbated as they will be by the Bosman judgment, and it's difficult to see how some clubs will survive in the long term. "It's a sobering thought that at least 10 clubs have to run their whole business with a total annual income, before transfers, of under £1 million."

In 1994-95:

Premier League players' earnings rose by a massive 22 per cent to £80 million.

The 92 Premier and Football League clubs spent a record £110 million on player transfers between themselves.

Newcastle spent the most on players at £21.2 million, a record for an English club in a year, followed by Everton with £12.7 million.

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