Why have Sunderland spent more than Leeds?

In the third part of the conversation with managing director Robbie Evans, he explains why fellow Premier League newboys Sunderland have been able to break the record for most money spent by a promoted side.

Since winning the play-off final, the Black Cats have spent £161.7m to bolster their squad, comfortably beating the outlay of £142m by Nottingham Forest in 2022.

While that may frustrate some Leeds supporters, Evans explains Sunderland are in a contrasting financial position in the PSR cycle.

"They are fascinating case studies," he said. "Sunderland has, in a good way, the perfect storm for creating PSR room.

"It is the combination of, as far as I am aware, little or no operating loss the past two seasons and a very low wage bill before getting promoted and selling their top talents for tens of millions.

"Now, they are effectively carrying no prior losses and a player sale profit into the Premier League, where they have a 48,000 capacity stadium waiting for them to sell out every game.

"They have the highest so-called cap room in the history of PSR and have been very aggressive, which they have a lot of credit for.

"Leeds come from the exact opposite position!"

Leeds have still spent upwards of £100m to strengthen Daniel Farke's squad for the demands of Premier League and Evans added the Whites had nothing like the room Sunderland could utilise in the market.

"Last year, Leeds had to get promoted because of the level of past player investment, the wage bill etc," he said. "So we doubled down on as much quality as possible last season to maximize our promotion odds.

"We lost roughly £60m in our company's accounts for the fiscal year 2024. That loss is inside of our three-year PSR window personal perspective. Between two years in the Championship and one year in the Premier League, you're allowed PSR losses of £61m.

"Those numbers are very similar, meaning this year we have to operate very efficiently to make our three-year window work.

"We are in almost entirely different circumstances from Sunderland."

Come back later on Wednesday for the final part of Adam's conversation with Evans.