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The Boffins at the CIES Football Observatory have released the 6th edition of its annual Demographic Study of the 31 top European Leagues. This took in 472 clubs and 11,653 players. Some pretty interesting findings including the fact that the clubs with the most stable squads (whose players have been at their club for an average of 5 years or more) are Barcelona and Manchester United, arguably the 2 most successful clubs over the last decade. Here are the highlights, but it can all be found at The CIES Football Observatory
- Despite the introduction of new rules in many countries and at UEFA club competition level, the percentage of footballers playing for the club where they started reached a new record low: 21.2%.
- The English Premier League has the second highest percentage of foreign footballers (60.4%), just after Cyprus.
- Brazil has the most exports in Europe with 471, with France second on 306
- Italy and England top the table for the largest squads (26.8 players per club on average). Italian Serie A also gathers the most seasoned footballers (27.3 years) and the least percentage of club-trained players (8.4%).
- The tallest league is German Bundesliga (183.8cm), while the shortest is Spanish Liga (180.1cm).
- Barcelona has the second shortest squad (177.4cm) among the 472 clubs surveyed.
- The highest percent of Internationals can be found in the Premier League - 44.3%. The club with the highest percent of Internationals is Chelsea with 80%
For those interested, Palace have a first team squad of 34 players. The next largest squad has 31.
