There are clubs that are financially in much worse positions. Valencia, for one. Pérez doesn’t own Real Madrid, he only runs the club. All that money is being charged to Real Madrid’s account, not to Pérez’s, he’s barred from using his own money to run the club. If he finishes this term as President with a minimal amount of debt, that will be more than some other clubs’ presidents/owners have managed.

Part of the argument is that these players are being overvalued – too much is being paid, thus inflating transfer fees across the board. Okay. But if that’s true, than donn’t the ’sellers,’ the ones taking the money for the player, stand to benefit the most? With the oodles received for the outgoing galactico, shouldn’t a team be able to stock itself with plenty of talent? If not, perhaps the player really was worth the obscene fee after all (though in most cases, Ronaldo’s especially, I doubt it).

Something needs to be changed. I think proportionately the spending is grossly out of balance from what it was 25 years ago when we had the first million pound signings or so.