The first round of the FA Cup is set to begin in November, with teams from League One and League Two officially getting involved now that the preliminary rounds are out of the way. The first and second rounds will take place in November – the latter overlapping with the FIFA World Cup – before teams from the Championship and Premier League enter from the third round which begins in January.
Before the big global names and brands make their way into the competition, we set out to see which teams in the first round have the highest market values on Transfermarkt. It’s worth noting that Transfermarkt arrives at these values based on multiple pricing models, including fan sentiment, and the value doesn’t necessarily reflect what the club would sell for – it is more an estimate of the club’s expected value on the free market.
Of the 80 teams who will compete in the first round starting from the weekend of November 4, Port Vale FC are placed 14th on the list, with a value of £6.84m. Their first-round opponents, Exeter City, are valued at £5.76m. For scale, Brentford, who knocked Port Vale out in the third round – and offer good value at 3/1 in the Premier League betting Top 10 markets – last season is valued at £269.1m.
Port Vale starts the FA Cup in a round that involves teams who are somewhat close to each other in terms of valuation and not drastically apart in terms of quality. Facing Exeter is a vastly different proposition to what will come later – the likes of Brentford, or financial giants Manchester City – and this has been born out over the last few years with Port Vale exiting the Cup earlier than the fourth round.
In a sense, the numbers somewhat dampen the romance that was previously associated with the FA Cup, which involved lower-tier teams having a shot at beating some of the big names in English football. With the financial imbalance that now persists in the game, there are fewer instances of such cup days.
This mismatch is evident when we continue our investigation into market values. As the FA Cup currently stands, the highest-valued club in the draw are Derby County, with a market value of £20.61m – again, a significant way off the Premier League teams who will enter the Cup in January.
Things haven’t been great for the Rams over the last few seasons, and it has been a well-documented collapse; the fact that their value is above second-placed Sheffield Wednesday (£13.1m) to the tune of 57% is something of a giveaway of the kind of times Derby County have had to endure after enjoying the relatively lofty heights of consistent Championship playoffs appearances before financial disarray set in.
Derby County is the only League One squad valued at over £20m and one of five teams from the league to be valued in double-digits. After Sheffield Wednesday, Portsmouth FC (£11.97m), Barnsley FC (£11.81m), and Ipswich Town (£11.3m) make up the top five.
What’s interesting to note is that our assumption that League One clubs would make up the top 20 by being at a higher level than other teams in the first round was disproved pretty early on. At 13th place in the value charts, just before Port Vale, is where League One’s streak ends in that regard.
League Two club Salford City – who are placed fifth at the time of writing – are the 13th most valuable club financially in the first round of the FA Cup. Their value of £6.93m narrowly pips Port Vale’s £6.84m. This quirk also exists when you look upwards from League One – Derby County is valued higher than Championship teams Rotherham United (£16.34) and Wigan Athletic (£15.17m).
Once the third round comes along, these numbers are going to look paltry and become yet another reflection of the massive disparities in English football at the moment. But on a more positive note, these numbers will also sweeten the feeling during the many upsets that are to come.
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