Manchester City: Premier League side receive highest Fifa payment for World Cup players

 Manchester City have been named as the highest-paid club by FIFA as part of their benefits programme for releasing players to the Qatar 2022 World Cup.

Manchester City received more money than any other club in the world for releasing players to the 2022 FIFA World Cup.

As part of FIFA's Club Benefits Programme, every club with a player at the World Cup was entitled to compensation for each day that player was involved in the tournament in Qatar, with a total of $209m (£160.90m) distributed to clubs across the world.

City had 15 senior players at the World Cup, while the programme also meant that clubs were entitled to a portion of the daily fee for each player if that player had played for them over the previous two seasons.

For each player, clubs were entitled to a payment of $10,950 (£8,429) per day, starting from the day they were released for international duty and ending the day after they finished their tournament with their respective national teams.

Of City's 15 players, 13 were involved in the knockout stages, with Julian Alvarez going all the way to the final as Argentina won the World Cup in Lusail against France.

That meant that City were awarded $4.60m (£3.54m), more than any other club. Barcelona were the next biggest beneficiaries, earning $4.54m (£3.47m).

City's income from the programme was over £1m more than the next two clubs in the Premier League, with Chelsea and Manchester United both earning £2.51m each. Tottenham took £2.18m, and Liverpool earned £1.86m. Bayern Munich were the only other club to top the $4m mark.

The report also highlighted the breakdown of fees awarded for players in the final, with City getting just under 10 per cent of Nicolas Otamendi's fee ($32,851) after his 2020 transfer to Benfica, while River Plate earned more (£262,810) than City did ($131,405) for Julian Alvarez, given the Argentine signed for City at the start of 2022.