Top 10 highest-paid sports teams in the world

The average annual first team pay at Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) reached US$ 9.08 million, ranking first among sports teams globally, according to the sixth edition of Sporting Intelligence’s global sports salaries survey. As the oil-rich Middle East nation Qatar has injected huge investment into the team since 2011, its players quickly became the highest-paid professional sportsmen in the world.

Real Madrid, Manchester City and Barcelona occupy the next three positions, with average annual salaries per player reaching US$8.64 million, US$8.6 million and US$8.08 million respectively.

Among the top 20 listed teams, four are from the English Premier League, namely Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool, and 11 are from the United States, though none of them are soccer teams.

The NBA remains the highest-paid league around the world, with its 448 players earning an average salary of US$4.58 million in the 2014-15 season.

The survey examined a total of 333 teams in 17 major pro leagues, covering seven sports, 13 countries and 9,731 athletes who make a combined US$17.94 billion in salary.

Here are the top 10 highest-paid sports teams in the world: