ROTHERHAM United have been hailed as “the smartest club in the Championship” by the country’s leading football-finance expert following the publication of their latest accounts.

The figures, which run up to the end of June 2022 and cover the Millers’ League One promotion, show a loss of £1.7 million.

Putting that in perspective, Kieran Maguire says it is a tenth of the average deficits posted by the teams they are now competing against in the second tier.

“For me, they’re the smartest club in the Championship,” he said. “They either break even or have by far the smallest losses in what is a complete car crash of a division. They simply say: ‘We’re not going to pay daft wages.'”

Maguire is a highly-respected academic, author and broadcaster. A lecturer at Liverpool University, he is also the man behind the acclaimed Twitter site, The Price of Football.

He says much of Rotherham’s loss can be attributed to the fact that their central funding (share of Premier League TV money) fell from £7.9m to £3m in their successful 2021/22 campaign following their drop into the third tier the previous year.

“The reduction in TV money accounts for probably 60 per cent of it,” he said. “That was counter-balanced, to an extent, by the return of fans. Obviously, the season before stadiums had been empty because of Covid.

“Promotion bonuses have to be factored in as well. That’s the paradox: if they hadn’t gone up, the losses would have been lower.”

Tony Stewart took over Rotherham 15 years ago and is determined to establish them long term in the Championship following three relegations since 2017.

The chairman invested heavily on recruitment in the January transfer window and, with eight games left to play, the Millers are on course to remain clear of the drop zone.

Maguire said: “They continue to be a well-run club and if they stay up this season I would expect them to make a smallish profit.

“I think they look to a four- or five-year period and say that over that time frame they’ll break even. You can’t say that about any other club in the Championship.”