Fulham back in Premier League after winning playoff

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Fulham earned the last promotion spot in the Premier League after beating Aston Villa 1-0 in the Championship playoff in London on Saturday. Team captain Cairney's decisive shooting led to the first-half goal that managed to promote the team to the top flight in the next season, the first since the team was relegated in 2014.

"After we missed out on promotion [in the playoffs] last season, a lot of people wrote us off. We got a lot of stick. But football won today. Football was the winner," Cairney said.

Fulham footballers celebrate the victory on the pitch. / @FulhamFC on Twitter

The west London club is looking forward to joining Championship title winners Wolverhampton Wanderers and Cardiff City in the Premiership, after winning what is believed to be the world's richest football game, as playoff winners are guaranteed 160 million pounds (212.91 million US dollars), according to the Deloitte Sports Business Group.

Specifically, Fulham will earn 95 million pounds (126.35 million US dollars) next season, as part of the Premier League's huge broadcasting rights deal, and up to 75 million pounds (99.75 million US dollars) in parachute payments in 2019-20 and 2020-21 should they fail to stay up.

Source(s): Reuters ,Xinhua News Agency