Home and Away | £1 million a week for Messi? China deal with Manchester City opens new frontier for celebrity player windfalls
It is only a matter of time when stars such as Lionel Messi reach this magic number as clubs are willing to pay because the returns promise to be much more
During a radio phone-in about Manchester City's rumoured offer to sign Lionel Messi on a weekly wage of £800,000 (HK$9.2 million), pundits and supporters pondered if any football player could ever be worth a £1 million a week.
No footballer should ever be worth such an obscene amount was the overwhelming consensus.
Of course, it's not a case of "if" a player can ever command such a fee, but when.
The EPL-sanctioned figures made for more depressing reading among those of us who find the unchecked commercialism and myriad leeches sucking the soul out of our sport repulsive
And that crazy payday came a step closer when the owners of Manchester City, the City Football Group, established a proper foothold in China this week, selling a 13 per cent stake to state-controlled Chinese investors CMC (China Media Capital) Holdings and CITIC Capital.
If the rumours about Messi and City are true, it's very noble of his agent (his father) to ask for the modest fee of £800,000. He could have easily sealed a million; City would pay through the nose for a football icon like Messi because the return on their investment would be swift and multiplied many times over.
Forget the Atomic Flea's ability to win games. In the grand scheme of modern football, it is his marketability that attracts City Football Group; it is in the business of brand building, commercial growth and profit. The game is a mere conduit to these aims.