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Qatar-owned Paris Saint-Germain have won the Champions League for the first time, the culmination of the Gulf state’s 14-year project to turn the French club into a football superpower.
Inside the Allianz Arena in Munich, PSG cruised to victory over an ageing Inter Milan side. The 5-0 scoreline was the widest margin in any Champions League final.
Qatar Sports Investment, a state-backed fund, bought PSG — then a team with little record of success and a reputation for violence at matches — for around €70mn in 2011 at the suggestion of then French president Nicolas Sarkozy. A few months earlier, Qatar had won the right to host the 2022 Fifa World Cup.
The new owners poured money into the club to attract big name players, including David Beckham and Zlatan Ibrahimović, and came to dominate domestic football. The team has won 11 league titles in the 14 years since the takeover, but until now had only appeared in one previous Champions League final in 2020, when it lost to Bayern Munich.
Under Qatari ownership, the club has spent €2.3bn on transfer fees, according to estimates from Transfermarkt, a similar amount to Manchester City, the English club owned by a member of the Abu Dhabi royal family.
Victory in Munich is a vindication of the club’s recent shift away from its previous approach of signing mega stars. Following the exit of front three: Neymar, Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappé, the team has been rebuild around younger, cheaper talent.
Saturday night’s result marks the second time in two years that a team backed by a Gulf state has won the continent’s top club competition. City won in 2023.
On the way to being crowned European champions, PSG broke several financial records. In 2017, it smashed the global transfer record to buy Neymar from Barcelona for €222mn. That fee has not yet been surpassed, although PSG’s signing of Mbappé for €180mn a year later has come the closest so far.
After signing Messi in 2021, PSG then recorded the highest ever wage bill in football history. The €728mn annual outlay was 109 per cent of the club’s revenue.
PSG ranked third in Deloitte’s 2025 ranking of football clubs by revenue, behind only Real Madrid and Manchester City. When Qatar acquired the club, it failed to make the top 30. A report published last week by consultancy Football Benchmark put an enterprise value on the club of €3.7bn.
The club’s rise has mirrored the fortunes of its Qatari president, Nasser Al-Khelaifi. The former tennis player was a vocal opponent of the failed European Super League, a position which led to his elevation into the top rung of decision-making in football.
He is now chair of the European Club Association, a lobby group of top teams, and sits on the executive committee of Uefa, European football’s governing body. He is also chair of BeIN, the Qatar-based sports broadcaster and sits on the board of Qatar Investment Authority, the country’s sovereign wealth fund.
Critics have long complained that PSG’s spending has harmed football by driving up transfer fees and wages, while human rights groups see Qatar’s ownership as “sportswashing”.
PSG’s European triumph comes with French football in the midst of a financial crisis. The league struggled to find a broadcaster last summer, eventually agreeing a last minute, cut-price deal with sports streamer DAZN.
However, that relationship has soured due to low demand from viewers, leaving the league once again in limbo over where its games will air in future. Unlike PSG, which receives large sums from appearing in the Champions League and big sponsorship deals, most French clubs are heavily reliant on domestic TV money.
