Castleford Spent 78p in the Pound on Wages and Still Finished Second From Bottom

In the 2024 Super League season covered by these accounts, Castleford finished 10th on 15 points, winning just 7 of 27 games and missing the play-offs comfortably. It was a difficult year on the field for a club that has spent recent seasons battling the wrong end of the table, and one without a notable Challenge Cup run to offset the league form.

The accounts show turnover of around £4.5m against staff costs of roughly £3.5m, meaning close to 78% of everything the club brought in went straight to wages. That left a loss before tax of around £1m for the year.

Despite the loss, the balance sheet held up reasonably well: net assets of around £3m, one of only two clubs in this dataset with a meaningfully positive net asset position, alongside estimated borrowings of about £1.5m and current assets of roughly £1m.

A high wages-to-turnover ratio at a club fighting relegation-adjacent form is a familiar pattern in rugby league's salary-cap era, spending toward the cap ceiling doesn't guarantee results, but a solid net asset position gave Castleford some room to absorb a tough season.

Unlike football, there's no transfer-fee market driving this kind of number: Super League clubs operate under a fixed salary cap with limited marquee-player dispensations, so a wage bill this close to turnover reflects cap-room decisions and contract length rather than one-off spending on registrations. For a club rebuilding through the bottom half of the table, that ratio leaves very little room for manoeuvre before the next accounts are due.

Where the turnover went

Roughly 78% of turnover went on wages in a season that ended with just seven league wins.