Jovic exit at Real exposes Perez's hypocrisy
“€5,000m has been lost by the clubs; we’re on the edge of ruin”, adding: “We don’t want the rich to be richer and the poor poorer. We have to save football. Everything I do is for the good of football, which is in a critical moment.”
Thus spoke Florentino Perez, the Real Madrid president, in April 2021 as he laid out the reasons why the European Super League's introduction was a necessity required to safeguard the very existence of the game. It was poppycock then and it remains the case now, of course.
Proof of the vacuity of Perez's dubious claim about clubs being “on the edge of ruin” can be seen already in this summer's transfer window. It was Real who tried desperately to prise Kylian Mbappe from Paris St-Germain back in May, offering an astronomical £114,0000 per day contract to the French forward to make the move to Santiago Bernabeu. It was Real that subsequently lavished E100m on Aurelian Tchouameni a few weeks later to bring the young midfielder to the Spanish capital from Monaco. It is the very same club, too, that has allowed Gareth Bale to depart on a free transfer this summer having ostracised him from the squad for much of the last three seasons despite handing him an annual salary of £25m in 2016. And it is also Senor Perez's club that has just stood back and watched as Luka Jovic, a E60m signing from Eintracht Frankfurt in 2019, joined Fiorentina on a free transfer with a 50% sell-on clause.
Chucking vast quantities of cash at whatever bright young thing catches their eye has been Perez and Real's modus operandi for years – no amount of poverty-pleading can disguise the reality that the Spanish giants have been, and continue to be, among the most financially viable clubs in Europe. Even during the pandemic – when the club lost £344m – there was little chance of them going bust. So what was Perez's real motivation for ESL? Plain and simply greed – or, to paraphrase his own words, the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.
New boys will revitalise the Championship
The debate about new money in lower division Scottish football is a heated one as I have found out previously in the shape of criticism for lauding upwardly mobile clubs that aren't afraid to upset the old order. The impact of significant investment in clubs down the pyramid has been seen in the changing face of League 2 in recent seasons but now the natural expression of that investment is bearing fruit even higher up the divisions with the promotions of Kelty Hearts and Edinburgh FC to League 1 and, particularly so, in the form of Cove Rangers and Queen's Park reaching the Championship.
The latter started their Betfred Cup campaigns in fine fashion on Saturday with a 5-2 win over Stranraer while Cove begin theirs against Albion Rovers tomorrow evening.
At Cove, Paul Hartley and Gordon Young deserve much of the credit for their ascent through the divisions so it will be interesting to see what kind of impact former Ross County Jim McIntyre has and whether – in light of a relatively quiet summer in the market – the club is suitably equipped for the challenge. Equally intriguing will be Queen's Park's debut in the Championship where Owen Coyle – another manager who had a rough time at County – is at the helm.
Whatever happens in the season ahead it's a breath of fresh air for Scottish football.
Serie A is the place to be again
During the 1980s and 1990s there was little doubt about which European league was the best. Serie A boasted the biggest names in world football and its clubs were regular winners of European competitions. The ban on English clubs in continental competition only served to strengthen the belief that Italy's was the league of choice for the best footballers to really make a name for themselves. Somewhere along the way – between the rise of Sky money in the Premier League and the Calciopoli scandal – Italian football lost its sheen. It became increasingly defensive and struggled to produce players of quality for the national team. Today, Serie A has recovered much of its lustre. Last season, it was the most exciting of the big five leagues with high-scoring thrillers and a wide-open title race for much of the campaign. Which is why it is heartening to see some of Scotland's best talent heading for a slice of La Dolce Vita. Josh Doig's imminent transfer to Verona – who were one of the league's most-improved teams in the second half of the season - rekindles memories of the great side of Preben Elkjaer and Hans-Peter Briegel that won Serie A in 1985 while this column has previously waxed lyrical about the job being done at Bologna, where Lewis Ferguson is expected to arrive soon. It's also exciting that these young players will get the chance to develop in a more competitive league without the need to head to a lower-level English Championship side.
Red-faces at Wimbledon
The narrative hasn't quite panned out as the All England Club might have hoped at this year's Wimbledon. First we had Saturday's ladies final in which Elena Rybakina defeated Ons Jabeur. You may recall that in May the All England Club decided to ban Russian competitors from the tournament – a move which prompted the ATP to strip the Grand Slam event of its ranking points. Wimbledon's decision backfired somewhat when Rybakina – who was born in Moscow to Russian parents, who lives in the Russian capital and who represented Russia before she changed allegiance to Kazakhstan in 2018 – came from a set down to beat her Tunisian opponent.
But it was nothing compared to the uncomfortable spotlight it shone elsewhere. In yesterday's men's final Nick Kyrgios played the first Slam final of his career in what should have been a fairytale. Instead it has been a particularly controversial fortnight for the irascible Australian – one in which he has been fined for spitting on a spectator, called 'evil' by an irate opponent because of his behaviour in a match and accused of domestic abuse by his former girlfriend, Chiara Passari.
It's just not cricket – or tennis – as the old codgers in the galleries at SW19 might say.
The Saudi rebels row rumbles on
The LIV Golf rebels claimed they received a warm welcome at the Genesis Scottish Open and certainly the controversy surrounding their presence in North Berwick – which required a legal intervention instigated by Ian Poulter, Justin Harding and Adrian Otaegui – did not hamper the latter pair's tournament too much even if Poulter seemed to buckle under the strain that negative publicity has brought.
Meanwhile, Graeme McDowell – who didn't play – gave a glimpse of his mindset to an Irish newspaper earlier this week but in the main it was just more of the same repurposed guff having to look after his future.
Far more fascinating were the words from Mike Lorenzo-Vera, the French golfer, who lifted the lid on what some of the Average Joes think about having to share a stage with the rebels.
“Someone needs to feed their family after 25 years on tour, earning £40 million and building one of the biggest car collections around,” he said. “You need to feed your family? Sell one Ferrari. They are showing huge disrespect to people saying this,” said Lorenzo-Vera of Poulter.
Meanwhile, footage of Pat Perez celebrating to the tune of Queen's 'We are the Champions' in the lounge of a luxury Saudi superjet last week merely emphasised the idea that you could have handpicked which of these tasteless guys would have joined the rebel tour pretty easily in a hypothetical bar-room chat six months ago.
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The percentage decrease in the Rangers Fans Token since it reached its all-time high in August last year according to a recent report published by Bankless Times – a financial website – into the decline in prices of crypto assets.
