VTB League releases 2014-15 budgets for league's Russian clubs

VTB United League president emeritus Sergey Ivanov released the 2014-15 budgets of the league's 10 Russian clubs at a press conference in the Kremlin today.

Russian clubs in the VTB United League are required to make their budgets available to the public each season. During the press conference, Sergey Ivanov revealed this season's budgets, while answering questions from the media.

CSKA once again has the largest budget at 2,277,500,000 rubles. Khimki is second at 884,000,000 rubles, while Lokomotiv-Kuban rounds out the top three at 752,300,000 rubles.

UNICS (530,587,000 rubles), Zenit (393,613,000 rubles), Nizhny Novgorod (390,826,000 rubles), Enisey (213,156,000 rubles), Krasny Oktyabr (164,090,000 rubles), Krasnye Krylia (160,000,000 rubles) and Avtodor (142,736,000 rubles) complete the list.

The budget for the VTB United League in 2014-15 is 375,000,000 rubles.

- No other sports leagues in Russia have released their budgets, - noted Sergey Ivanov. - We will continue to require this of all Russian teams. It's one of the conditions for entering the league. Everything must be transparent. I'm happy that the percentage of clubs funded by local government is decreasing. Several budgets, including CSKA's, increased some because of the exchange rate. That was to be expected. But you can see for yourselves that the game isn't played with money. Avtodor Saratov, for example, reached the playoffs, despite having the smallest budget. That's a huge achievement.

Budgets in Euro

CSKA Moscow 41.7
Khimki Moscow 16.2M
Lokomotiv Kuban 13.8M
Unics Kazan 9.7M
Zenit SPB 7.2M
Nizhny Novgorod 7.1
Enisey Krasnoyarsk3.9M
Krasny Oktyabr 3M
Krasnye Krylya Samara 2.9M
Avtodor Saratov 2.6M