Carlisle United have made £450,000 from player sales this season, chief executive Nigel Clibbens has revealed.

That is the sum the Blues have recouped from the departures of stars such as Aaron Hayden and George Tanner.

It is the first time United have commented publicly on the sort of figures they brought in from the high-profile departures.

Hayden joined Wrexham on the eve of the season while fellow defender Tanner joined Bristol City shortly before the August transfer deadline.

The figure is cited by Clibbens in an update on the club's website, where he said: "We have earned £0.45m income in the first half of 21/22 from player sales."

The director also used his report to highlight the benefits of income from the controversial Papa John's Trophy.

The cup competition, boycotted by some fans over its involvement of Premier League under-21 clubs, has helped United earn £100,000 from cup competitoins in 2021/22.

"Without the Trophy prize money our cup income would be minimal this year," Clibbens said. "This cup cash is important to help pay bills and fund player recruitment."

Clibbens said United have earned a net profit of £0.4m in the first six months of 21/22 - a figure boosted by a £166,000 grant from the Premier League - but forecast to make a loss of £0.4m by the year end.

The United chief said the Blues "must continue to be a self-funded club, day-to-day.

"We must pay for our football spending, including funding our recovery in the league and the January window, from our own cash, not third-party money.

"This model remains unchanged after the ending of takeover talks, and in practice has been the case since before 2019."

United ended takeover talks with parties connected to businessman Philip Day in December, stating they were now seeking new investment.

Owners, shortly before then, also signed a document authorising a situation where a director could have a conflict of interest. They have not commented on that in response to the News & Star's invitation this week.

Clibbens said in his article that it is important to be "transparent" about the club's finances in order "to counter the misinformation, inaccurate reports and hearsay that fans can pick up and come to believe, especially on social media."

Further details provided by the director include that United have earned £175,000 from season tickets in half-year trading to December 31, and £325,000 match ticket income.

"This is better than budgeted and proving resilient as fans continue to back the team – as also shown by the gate numbers," said Clibbens, who also said United's retail results were "the best since 2016/17".

He added that catering operations, which United brought back in-house this season, were "now profitable", but said commercial income "remains challenging" and was "recovering slowly" after Covid lockdowns.

Clibbens, meanwhile, said Unitd were "incurring significant additional extra stewarding costs on match days to deal with potential fan safety issues and Covid.

"As I indicated before, this is taking much-needed cash that can be better spent elsewhere, and increases the ongoing trading loss."

Clibbens reiterated that spending on the team was up by 20 per cent as of last June.

"Further increases will follow after the January window as the club supports Keith Millen," he said.

"We will receive circa £0.33m of additional Premier League grant support in 21/22 [with £166k received in the first half year].

"However, we have unplanned exceptional costs from higher Covid compliance, Covid postponements and the costs from a change of manager [the sacking of Chris Beech and appointment of Millen]."