An initialism for Financial Fair Play. Introduced by UEFA as a way to prevent clubs spending beyond their means. The basic idea: you can't spend more than you earn, with some allowances for infrastructure and youth investment. Clubs that break the rules can face fines, transfer bans, or even exclusion from European competitions. Manchester City and PSG have both been investigated, though the punishments rarely seem to stick. UEFA replaced FFP with new "Financial Sustainability" rules in 2022, but people still call it FFP.
How are they able to spend that much money considering FFP?
Like xG but only for shots that actually hit the target. It measures how good the shot was, not just the chance. A weak shot straight at the keeper from a great position has high xG but low xGOT. A rocket into the top corner from 25 yards has low xG but high xGOT. Useful for evaluating keepers - if they're conceding more than xGOT, they're underperforming.
Alisson's 2021-22 season saw him concede significantly fewer goals than his xGOT would predict, meaning he was saving shots that most keepers wouldn't - concrete evidence that Liverpool's No.1 was among the world's best.
A visual showing where a player spends their time on the pitch, with warmer colors (red, orange) indicating more activity. Heat maps reveal actual positioning versus nominal position - a "
winger" whose heat map is entirely central isn't playing like a winger. They show work rate, defensive contribution, and where a player's influence is concentrated.
Salah's heat map at Liverpool shows he's much more than a right
winger. The warm zones extend into central areas and even the left side, showing how much he drifts to find space and get involved across the front line.
Creating numerical advantage in a specific area of the pitch. Three attackers against two defenders is an overload. You move players into zones to outnumber the opposition, then exploit the spare man. Guardiola teams overload the half-spaces constantly; wide overloads involve full-backs and wingers combining; central overloads pack the middle of the pitch. The spare man should always be free if you work the ball quickly enough.
Manchester City create overloads everywhere. Three players on the right combine, the defense shifts, and suddenly the left side has two City players against one defender. The overload creates the chance.
Spreading the cost of a transfer fee across the length of the player's contract for accounting purposes. A £100m signing on a 5-year deal costs £20m per year on the books, not £100m upfront. It matters for Financial Fair Play and profit/loss calculations. Clubs use it to make expensive signings look more affordable. Understanding amortization explains a lot of weird transfer behavior.
When Barcelona signed Neymar back from PSG being discussed, amortization explained why they couldn't afford it - his remaining contract value was still being paid off on their books, and adding another massive fee would destroy their accounting.
