Wondered why Pompey were in trouble? Wonder no more...

Portsmouth's wage bill for the current season is more than £50m, Observer Sport has learned. If they are to remain a going concern they must find a crippling £4.3m a month to pay it, until May at the earliest.

Once tax and NI payments are added to the basic £1.8m players receive each month, and other staff wages are taken into account, the club are still shelling out far more in wages than their Premier league TV money and matchday income combined.

The chief executive, Peter Storrie, accounts
for more than £100,000 a month and earns £1.4m a year.

Some sources at the club suggested that the monthly outgoings include payments to ex-players, and even former manager Harry Redknapp, though this was not confirmed by a club spokesman who declined to comment on the wage bill.

The players, many of whom have since been sold, who won the 2008 FA Cup and qualified for the Uefa Cup were promised bonuses that added up to far more money than Portsmouth made in their Cup run. Some of this money is still outstanding.

In a January column for Observer Sport goalkeeper David James wrote: "After we won the Cup I was told that one of our financial people predicted it would ruin us. They were right.
The heavy bonus culture, endemic in our game, became the curse as the earnings of the Cup run did not tally up with the bonuses paid out.
"I'm a big fan of performance-related pay, but if it's not within the realms of reality then it's just irresponsible. Who would have thought
qualifying for Europe and winning the FA Cup would cause such problems?"

"It doesn't surprise in me in the least, its symptomatic of the chaotic
regimes we have had at Fratton Park in recent years," said Colin
Farmery, of the Pompey Virtual Alliance, a coalition of various
supporters groups.

The size of the wage bill explains why the financially stricken club are all but certain to become the first in Premier League history to enter administration.

Manager Avram Grant has the smallest squad in the League, with numbers depleted by the departure since last summer of 14 players, among them Sol Campbell, Peter Crouch, Glen Johnson, Sylvain Distin, Niko Kranjcar, Djimi Traoré, Sean Davis, Younes Kaboul, and David Nugent, who is on loan at Burnley but not off the wage bill. Nugent's wages are jointly taken care of by Portsmouth and Burnley.

Portsmouth's highest earner is David James, who is paid around £50,000 a week. But beyond the England goalkeeper very few players are thought to earn a similar salary. John Utaka has been widely reported as earning £80,000 a week, though the club say the real ­figure is about a third of that. He does, however, boost his earnings ­considerably with bonus payments.

Redknapp, speaking on Friday, denied that wages were the problem but made no mention of hefty bonuses. He is thought to been awarded a £1m bonus for winning the FA Cup, with his ­players picking up in excess of £250,000 a-man.He said: "People talk nonsense about wages, you see all this rubbish about John Utaka earning eighty grand a week, he's not. He's earning £28,000 a week. Peter Storrie told me that, Peter showed me his contract the other week. "They keep saying about the wages they paid, it's rubbish. I don't know where the money's gone, it's gone ­somewhere."

Beyond the wage bill, the Observer Sportcan reveal other costs that explain why ­Portsmouth are in such trouble.
They appear certain to go into administration, which would mean a
nine-point ­deduction and certain relegation.

The club owe nearly £10m in unpaid transfer fees, and £4.4m to agents, among them Pini Zahavi, the Israeli agent, and the Stellar group, which are owed £2.3m and £310,000 respectively.

Portsmouth are due at the High Court tomorrow week for the winding-up petition served by Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, which will decide the fate of the 112-year-old club.Given the scale of the debts, estimated at £60m, and the outgoings, it appears highly improbable that any new investment orbuyer will be found before the 1 March hearing.

portsmouth went downhill since the first arab bought the club. he pretty much messed the club. and then the new owner stepped in and the trouble just got worse.

Clubs only have themselves to blame for the current wage structures. If they had all stuck together and said we aren't paying what players demand.

As good as these players are, no footballers deserves the likes of £100,000 a week. Thats just ridiculous. I know people say but they can only play till they are mid 30's at best. THEN GET ANOTHER JOB AFTER YOU FINISHED PLAYING DUMB ASSES.