Highest paid player from EVERY Premier League season shows wages skyrocketing

A list detailing the highest paid player in the Premier League every year since its inception has revealed the jaw-dropping rise in player salaries in just 31 years.

Inaugurated ahead of the 1992-93 season, the revamped English top-flight competition quickly became a byword for a staggering injection of money and glamour into domestic football.

Fuelled by a bumper broadcasting deal with Sky, cash flowed into the game and player wages became an increasingly lucrative way to hold on to clubs' brightest talents.

Over 30 years later, the Premier League's latest broadcasting deal, which will run from 2025 to 2029, is worth a whopping £6.7 billion - and salaries have inflated to match.

Whilst 2023-24's highest earner - Manchester City's Kevin De Bruyne - sees his salary dwarfed by the £164 million a year Cristiano Ronaldo makes at Saudi Pro League side Al-Nassr, his £400,000-a-week wages makes John Barnes' 1992-93 take-home pay look paltry in comparison.

The Liverpool icon was richly rewarded for his contributions in the first season of the Premier League, and its second, with his salary of £10,000 per week - £520,000 per year - the highest in the division.

But he was knocked off the top spot by Manchester United's star forward Eric Cantona for the 1994-95 season, who nearly doubled his total with his £18,000-a-week salary.

Cantona's table-topping wages would set a precedent for the red side of Manchester, whose players took home the highest salaries 12 seasons out of 32.

Their crosstown rivals Manchester City trail them as the club with the second-deepest pockets for player wages, with their players topping the charts in seven seasons.

Announcing their purchase of the club with a bang in 2008, the Abu Dhabi United Group tempted Robinho away from Real Madrid in a British record £32.5m move, they proceeded to make him the league's highest earner with a blockbuster salary of £160,000 a week during the 2008-09 season.

His high wage would be superceded the following season by another of City's eye-catching early takeover signings, Carlos Tevez, whose £250,000-a-week wages quickly dwarfed the Brazilian transplant's.

Tevez's paycheck would hold onto the top spot for four consecutive seasons, the second time that a player's salary had done so, after Roy Keane.

The Man United midfielder was given a hefty payrise after winning the Treble under Sir Alex Ferguson in 1998-99, and was paid £52,000 per week the following season.

His salary then increased to £90,000 a week for 2001-02, and was boosted to £94,000 a week a season later.

Wayne Rooney held similar sway between the 2013-14 and 2016-17 seasons with his £300,000-a-week wage, only to be knocked off the top spot by future Red Devil Alexis Sanchez.

But despite De Bruyne's hold on the top spot for the last two seasons, the real No 1 is his goalscoring team-mate, Erling Haaland.

The Norway international's coffers are boosted by a raft of impressive add-ons and bonuses that last season were all but guaranteed due to his blistering form.

This means that Haaland could take home an upwards of £865,000-a-week should he meet a number of targets.