FA Cup prize money: How much can clubs earn in the third round and what is an FA Cup run worth?
Ah, the men’s FA Cup third round: the romance of lower league teams getting their shot at Premier League giants, the magic of part-timers upsetting the superstars, and the prize money and other financial rewards that can transform a small football club’s fortunes.
This weekend is when the prize money hits six figures, and that’s before factoring a potentially lucrative split of gate receipts and bonuses for being one of the many games picked for live television broadcast in the UK. Here is how it works.
FA Cup prize money
There is a total prize fund of more than £19m on offer in this season’s FA Cup, and teams can receive a slice of it right from the extra preliminary round in August.
Those falling at the first hurdle get £375, while the winners are assured of at least £4.1m. Naturally, the payments increase with each round, and those who go furthest accrue the biggest windfalls.
A win in the third round of the FA Cup is worth £105,000 in prize money. The total £3.36m at stake at this stage is reserved for winners of the ties; the losers exit with whatever they earned in previous rounds, if they were involved.
But that is not the end of the financial rewards, with ticket money and, potentially, broadcast revenue topping up the payments.
How are gate receipts split in the FA Cup?
Ticket money can be one of the most lucrative elements of the FA Cup for lower division clubs.
This is because the competition rules stipulate that both teams receive an equal 45 per cent share of gate receipts from their tie, regardless of where it is played.
So if a small team is drawn away at a Premier League giant with a big stadium, they can bank a small fortune, as Cambridge United did when they played Manchester United at Old Trafford in 2015.
The most comparable examples in this year’s third round are fourth-tier Stevenage travelling to Aston Villa on Sunday and third-tier Portsmouth’s trip to Tottenham on Saturday.
How much are FA Cup TV payments?
On top of prize money and gate receipts, the clubs whose games are selected for broadcast on live television in the UK receive an additional payment.
This has historically exceeded £100,000 from the third round onwards. Payments to clubs for televised replays are worth around half as much.
So what is an FA Cup run worth?
For some teams, an FA Cup run can be worth more than £1m, which can be transformational for those outside of the Premier League.
Cambridge United banked seven figures in gate receipts and TV money alone from their fourth round trip to Manchester United.
Sutton United, meanwhile, estimated that they earned around £1m from their run to the fifth round when they were still a non-league side in 2017.
That brought them a visit from Arsenal to Gander Green Lane, even though it would have been more lucrative to play the tie at Emirates Stadium.
Although they lost to the Gunners, they earned enough to invest significantly in the club and they credit the cash injection with helping them reach to the English Football League for the first time in 2021.
So, as the third round gears up again, it’s worth remembering that FA Cup prize money can go a very long way.