Tonali to Tottenham proves the Big Six has been protected forever | OneFootball

Considering he has been publicly angling for a move for months, Newcastle fans will not be too surprised that Sandro Tonali could leave this summer. The fact that his likely destination is the team that finished 17th last season will be a far bigger shock.

Despite needing all 38 games to avoid being relegated from the Premier League last season, Tottenham are reportedly on the verge of taking Tonali from Newcastle, a club that finished five spots higher last season and above them in three of the last four campaigns.

Of course, real-world factors like swapping Newcastle for London play a part but ultimately, it’s a question of which club Tonali believes is the most likely to reach and remain in the top echelon of football; after all the calculations were done, he has chosen Spurs.

The money required for such a move was never a problem – Tottenham generated £565m from the 2024/25 season despite finishing 17th. That figure puts them seventh in the world, which neatly underlines that the Big Six’s position as the kings of Premier League football remains intact.

Tottenham are not alone in this pulling power. Last season, Manchester United were able to sign two of the Premier League’s top performers in Bryan Mbeumo and Matheus Cunha despite finishing 15th. Chelsea finished 10th last season and yet were able to lure Xabi Alonso. Could Brentford, who finished one spot ahead, have done similar? Of course not.

There is an established elite in the Premier League and no matter where any of those Big Six clubs finish, their pulling power will remain unmatched by any other club with big ambitions.

As to how we got here, the answer is money.

The Big Six used to be the top four, made up of Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea. The latter of those shoved their way to the top table by spending bucket loads of cash under Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich.

Tottenham joined in the early 2010s with a succession of high finishes. Manchester City then added themselves with the arrival of Sheikh Mansour and the UAE.

In theory, paths like Chelsea’s and City’s were possible for any club but the Big Six got wise and pulled up the drawbridge.

In February 2013, the first form of financial control was introduced to the Premier League under the guise it would make the league more competitive, but also protect clubs from going out of business. Except Premier League clubs going out of business was never a concern. Barring Wimbledon who were liquidated for non-football reasons, the last top-flight club to go out of business was in 1915.

As for competitiveness; that might have been true had the rules not been based on the revenue that a club generates, locking in the advantage the Big Six enjoys over the rest. It is an advantage they have flexed ever since.

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, which owns 85% of Newcastle, surpasses the net worth of any other Premier League owner and yet Newcastle’s purchase of Nick Woltemade was the only non-Big Six signing of the top 14 most expensive last summer. Alexander Isak is the club’s most expensive signing since PIF arrived and yet that is only the 22nd most expensive signing in Premier League history. It’s a long way from giddy talk of Kylian Mbappe.

In a perfect world, we would all agree that foreign states not being able to buy whoever they want for their club was good for the overall health of the game, but the problem is that these rules have come long after the horse is bolted.

Financial Fair Play has been replaced by Squad Cost Ratio but that follows the same principle, with clubs allowed to spend up to 85% of football-related revenue on squad costs.

Clubs like Newcastle and Villa will simply never generate as much revenue as the Big Six because a football club will not grow a bigger audience if it is not competing at the top end of the table and winning trophies. And that’s impossible if you cannot keep hold of your best players.

Unless something drastically changes, the Premier League will always be a case of the haves and have nots. Clubs like Brighton, Bournemouth and Crystal Palace can enjoy holding onto a top player for just a few years before one of the big boys comes along and takes them. The fact that Newcastle and potentially Aston Villa cannot break away from that coterie of have nots tells you everything about why the Big Six has nothing to do with the league table.