The total cost of Gareth Bale’s move to Real Madrid from Tottenham Hotspur has been revealed as close to €101m, more than the price of Cristiano Ronaldo.
AS cites the website Football Leaks as the source of the full details of the 2013 operation, and puts the complete fee at just short of €101m, when the €99m transfer sum and solidarity payment of more than €1m is combined.
Madrid paid €96m to get Ronaldo from Manchester United but had always insisted Bale came cheaper than the Portuguese.
AS notes that the contract does allow for Bale’s fee to be €91m, which Madrid claimed as the cost of the transfer, but there were two options for payment and Madrid chose the instalment method, which saw the cost rise to the higher amount.
If Madrid had paid up front Bale would have cost €87m, once a discount on the solidarity payment had been taken into account.
Bale was though paid for through four instalments of almost €25m, which came 10 working days after the transfer was completed, then July 24, 2014 or before, and so on for 2015 and 2016.
Tottenham included the right of first refusal should Bale ever leave Santiago Bernabeu and the contract also prohibits Spurs from giving any financial information to the Press. It also says Madrid will publically announce the transfer at €91m, which they did.
Madrid are also contractually obliged to ensure Bale does not speak ill of his former club, its President or any of its employees.
Los Blancos also waived any portion not yet paid of the fee for Rafael van der Vaart, who left Madrid for Spurs in 2010.
