SAINTS’ terrible season cost them £12.8m in Premier League prize and television money.

Clearly it could have been far more costly had Saints been relegated to the Championship for the first time since 2004/05.

But, nonetheless, Saints’ fall from the top eight, where the club finished in four successive seasons before 2017/18, has hit them in the wallet.

When all is totted up, Saints have raked in an eye-watering £109.7m for their 17th-place finish in the top-flight, which is a come down from last term’s whopping £122.5m dished out by the TV-money rich Premier League.

The prize and TV dosh for each club is calculated according to finishing position of the team and the number of games shown on the box.

Because Saints ended with 16 games broadcast on television, they ended up with more dosh in their pockets than 16th-placed Huddersfield (£104.5m) and 14th-placed Watford (£108.4m) who both had fewer TV matches.

Each club also get an equal share of domestic and overseas TV money, which amounts to around £84m apiece.

Manchester United were the highest earner of this season, banking £153.6m despite finishing 19 points behind champions Manchester City who collected £153.2m.