The temporary transfer of players is a practice much in vogue in professional football. It is used, notably, to allow the development of young players who do not yet have sufficient playing experience or a good enough sporting level to play in their owner club. But to what extent are young players concerned? And more generally, what is the percentage of players on loan? What are the differences according to leagues and positions played? Which clubs loan the most players?
This report answers these questions through the analysis of the characteristics of players present on the 1st March 2023 in the first team squads of 1,254 teams in 75 leagues from 57 associations worldwide.

This report analyses the transfer fees invested over the past ten seasons by clubs worldwide so as to measure the evolution of the sums involved and the inflation at the level of players’ prices. The latter is measured both in a global manner for all footballers whatever their characteristics, as well as for particular market segments.

This report identifies 200 players – the top 10 in 20 classification categories – who were born after the 1st January 2002 and have gained the most playing experience in 2022. It is a showcase of the exclusive CIES Football Observatory approach for player scouting, gathering within a coherent framework different and complementary information such as playing time, competitive level, positions, technical domains of activity, age, contract duration and transfer value.

This report traces the development paths of players selected for the 2022 FIFA men’s World Cup. It analyses the current clubs and leagues of World Cup participants (chapter “Employment”), the clubs and associations where these footballers have been for at least three years between their 15th and 21st birthday (chapter “Training”), as well as the teams and senior leagues where they have played official matches up until they turned 23 (chapter “Development”).

Since 2009, the CIES Football Observatory carries out a census of players from clubs in 31 top divisions of UEFA member associations, enabling us to better understand the dynamics at work in the European football players’ labour market. This report presents the demographic portrait of players, clubs and leagues across Europe, as well the main trends observed.

This report compares the recruitment policies of big-5 league teams from the perspective of the age of players signed. The first part analyses the average age of recruitment of players currently in squads, both by league and by club. The second part studies the policies pursued over the past decade by the fifty clubs always present in the big-5 over this period.