Ħamrun Spartans to net €3.8 million from historic UEFA Conference League run

Ħamrun Spartans have guaranteed themselves €3.817 million following their historic qualification to the league phase of the UEFA Conference League, the Times of Malta can confirm.

On Thursday, the Spartans became the first Maltese side to book their place in the League Phase of a UEFA club competition when they battled to a 2-2 draw against Latvian side FC RFS at the LNK Sporta Parks Arena in Riga to complete a 3-2 aggregate win.

While it’s a groundbreaking achievement for Maltese football, it also yields a huge financial benefit for the club itself as well as all the other teams in the Malta Premier League.

From UEFA’s yearly total prize money fund of €3.345 billion allocated for the three European club competitions. Only 10%, which amounts to €300.1 million, is reserved for UEFA Conference League prize money.

This is divided among 144 participating clubs according to two main criteria – the performance-based pillar, i.e., payments made to clubs according to how they perform in the tournament, and the TV Market Value Pillar, payments made to clubs on the basis of the value of their TV market.

Ħamrun Spartans opened their European journey this summer with a historic victory over Lithuanian side FK Zalgiris in the first qualifying round of the UEFA Champions League.

That qualification to the second qualifying round of UEFA’s elite competition ensured the Spartans would surely contest the Play Off round of the Conference League should they be eliminated from both the Champions League and the Europa League.

That run to the UEFA Conference League yielded the Spartans a total sum of €3.17 million.

Added to those funds, the Spartans will receive an additional €175,000 for every round played in a UEFA club competition, which raises the total amount of revenue to €3.87 million.

The earnings do not stop there.

Each victory in the group phase is worth approximately €400,000, while a draw earns €133,000.

Additional performance bonuses include €400,000 for a top-eight finish in the league phase and €200,000 for placing between ninth and 24th.

Therefore, the Spartans will also be driven by the lure of earning more prize-money during the league phase as if they manage to secure at least one win in the competition, it would see their earnings break the four-million-euro mark.

Added to that, UEFA also makes payments to the 36 clubs that qualify for the League Phase according to their TV market value.

For example, Chelsea, last year’s winners, who come from the top 5 league, earned €3 million from TV Market share in 2024/25 season.

While clubs coming from lower-ranked leagues can earn depending on the five-year and 10-year coefficients set by UEFA for their league.

Larne FC, from Ireland, last season made €444,000 from TV market share.