Chapter 404: The World's Highest Annual Salary
Although the team had officially announced its disbandment at the championship celebration ceremony, Su Dong still got up early the next morning to train, mainly for some recovery training.
Nuno Cruz and other members of the personal coaching team have already started their vacation, so Su Dong trains alone.
After the training, he had breakfast with his parents, and then asked the driver to drive Wang Chuqing to the airport personally.
She booked an early flight back to Munich today.
Thanks to the disguise, no one discovered him along the way.
Perhaps, everyone in Barcelona has not yet recovered from last night's carnival.
When Su Dong returned home, Mendes was already waiting for him.
"Congratulations, Sue! Great job!"
As soon as Mendes saw Su Dong, he immediately stood up and greeted him, smiling from ear to ear.
Today, Su Dong is like a cash cow. Mendes does not need to do anything at all. Every day, someone will take the initiative to send money to his door in every possible way. This allows him to fully experience the pleasure of being the agent of the world's top superstars.
Not to mention anything else, even world-class brands such as Nike, BMW, and Audi have deep business dealings with him, which has allowed his channels and personal connections to develop at a deeper level than before, and will be of great help to his future career.
Su Dong was quite satisfied with his agent.
The reason why Mendes has been able to expand his career in recent years is not only because Su Dong is leading the way, but also because he himself is very capable.
Apart from anything else, this Portuguese agent is definitely extraordinary based on his reputation among the players and his ability to play both sides between the players and the club.
As his business expands, Mendes no longer hangs around Su Dong all day like before. It is said that he has even started to get involved in some third-party player ownership businesses, mainly in South America, where the football environment is relatively chaotic, especially Brazil.
I have mentioned this to Su Dong before and asked him if he was interested, but Su Dong did not intend to get involved.
Third-party ownership sounds nice, but to put it bluntly, it's really treating players as commodities.
As a player, Su Dong is still quite disgusted with this, but the chaotic South American football market, especially in Brazil, does have a strong demand in this regard, so naturally there is business in this area.
Mendes is an agent. From a businessman's perspective, if he doesn't do it, the market will be taken away by others, which is understandable.
…
"Yesterday, Soriano called me and said he is now in charge of the players' transfers and contract renewals."
After the two chatted for a while, Mendes took the initiative to talk about the progress of the contract renewal.
Barcelona had already decided to renew the contract with Su Dong half a year ago. Laporta had even mentioned this to Su Dong in person before, saying that he would start contract renewal negotiations with Su Dong after the end of the season.
Now that the Champions League is in hand and all the games of this season have been settled, it is natural that they should be put on the agenda.
Su Dong called Mendes over for the same purpose.
"What did they say?" Su Dong asked with concern.
"As far as I know, in addition to you, Iniesta and Messi are also included in Barcelona's contract renewal plan. Messi should be officially confirmed. I heard that the annual salary offered is 1 million euros, which is not bad."
Su Dong was not surprised, this was as it should be.
Both Messi and Iniesta have performed very well this season, and both have even begun to threaten Giuly's position. The French winger is now slow to integrate into the team, and he is not strong enough for the team to tailor a right-wing offensive tactic specifically for him, resulting in his current position being unstable.
Sometimes it's like this, the team has limited tactical authority, and if you give it to one person, you can't give it to another.
The key is that Giuly was absent for a period of time due to injury last season, when Iniesta and Messi performed very well.
Coupled with the support of Su Dong, these two people rose quickly in Barcelona.
Everyone knows that Xiaobai and Messi are Su Dong's followers.
"Marcos Senna is also going to renew his contract, but I am still in talks and I hope to further establish his position," Mendes smiled.
This is another treasure in his possession.
You know, when Su Dong recommended him to him, Mendes didn't care much about it, and even looked down on it. But after Marcos Senna played a game for Barcelona, Mendes was surprised to find that he had picked up a treasure.
"Senna does have the ability to become a main player. It is a good thing to strive for it. Besides, he is not young anymore. If he doesn't fight for it now, it will be more difficult in the future." Su Dong is quite supportive of Mendes' idea.
Marcos Senna was recommended by him and he is also his die-hard fan. Su Dong must strongly support such a player. More importantly, he is really old. After he turns 30, Barcelona probably won't be very interested in renewing his contract. At that time, he can only retire to other teams to retire.
Therefore, it is better to seize the opportunity now to fight for a starting position and try to extend the contract as much as possible.
This should be the last long-term contract in Marcos Senna's career.
"What about me? How do they position me?" Su Dong asked with concern.
Mendes smiled. In fact, Su Dong’s contract renewal was the easiest to negotiate because the initiative was in the hands of Su Dong and Mendes.
"Barcelona are very sincere in renewing the contract. They really want to finalize the contract as soon as possible, but there are a few problems now."
"Tell me about it."
"First of all, the most important thing is the annual salary. The annual salary offered by Barcelona for the renewal is 8 million euros after tax, which is a lot more than before. The bonuses and appearance fees are also relatively increased. Frankly speaking, I am not very satisfied with this."
"Eight million euros?" Su Dong thought about it and actually felt that it was okay. "As far as I know, Real Madrid offered salaries of 6.4 million euros after tax to superstars such as Zidane, Ronaldo, Raul and Beckham."
What Su Dong meant was that 8 million euros after tax was actually acceptable.
He has never had a strong concept of annual salary, because annual salary actually accounts for less than 30% of his income.
Now most of his income comes from commercial sponsorship, especially sponsorship from some world-class brands.
In today's world football, the only person who can do this, besides Su Dong, is Beckham.
But you have to know that when it comes to commercial sponsorship income, Beckham doesn't even have half of Su Dong's.
It is not difficult to understand why Su Dong does not care much about annual salary.
"We don't compare ourselves with the Galacticos, because Florentino comes from a large management group and he attaches great importance to the salary structure. Do you know why Real Madrid wants to sell Makelele? Wouldn't they rather let him go than meet his tiny salary increase request?"
“Salary structure?”
Mendes nodded. "Real Madrid has always attached great importance to Makelele. Florentino is not stupid. Everyone can see Makelele's importance. But the problem is that if Makelele's annual salary requirements are met, the salaries of others will also increase, and Real Madrid's overall salary structure will increase, which exceeds the salary red line set by Florentino."
Su Dong also heard about this incident, and later let go of McManaman and other substitute players for the same reason.
Ultimately, Beckham's joining significantly increased Real Madrid's salary expenditure, which naturally squeezed the salary space of players such as Makelele, and Real Madrid eventually had to sell him.
As for what Florence said to the public, that it is easy to find someone to replace Makelele, that was just his statement after deciding to sell the player. I guess even he himself doesn't believe it.
"I found some information recently." Mendes smiled as if he was presenting a treasure.
"What?"
"Do you know that when Laporta first took office, Barcelona's annual salary expenditure was as high as 120 million euros. Who has the highest salary among them?"
"It seemed to be Kluivert. I remember it was reported in the media at the time."
This is also the reason why Barcelona was determined to sell the Dutch center. The salary was too high, but he did not play to his full value.
"His annual salary after tax was over 10 million euros, which was the highest annual salary in world football at the time. There was no other player with that salary. Mendieta's annual salary was also very high, reaching 7.5 million euros after tax. There were also Puyol, Riquelme, Luis Enrique and others, whose annual salaries reached or even exceeded 5 million euros. Even Gerard was close to 5 million euros."
Kluivert, Mendieta, Riquelme, Luis Enrique and others have retired or transferred and have all left Barcelona. Gerard is also basically certain to transfer this summer.
Puyol is the captain and the backbone of the defense. His annual salary is slightly lower than that of Suarez and Ronaldinho.
If the information Mendes obtained is true, then during Gaspart's time at Barcelona, the team's annual salary structure was indeed ridiculously high, and it could even be said to be completely out of control.
"After winning the Champions League this season, according to convention, there will definitely be a pay rise. I have heard that Ronaldinho's annual salary requirement for a contract extension is already 9 million euros. Barcelona now wants to lower our annual salary and then talk to others."
Su Dong understood what Mendes meant.
Barcelona's operating strategy is simple. If Su Dong's annual salary is only 8 million euros, how can others negotiate? At that time, Ronaldinho himself would be embarrassed to offer an annual salary of 9 million euros, right? It can also be said that on the surface this is Su Dong's contract renewal, but in fact, it is also a contract renewal negotiation for other players.
"What do you mean?" Su Dong asked.
This is really not what he is good at.
"We don't ask for much, at least the same as Kluivert."
When Mendes said this, he smiled proudly and said, "You are now a double Footballer of the Year, and you just helped Barcelona complete such an epic comeback in the Champions League final. What did Kluivert have back then? He can get an annual salary of 10 million euros after tax, so why can't we?"
Su Dong nodded slightly. Who would complain about making too much money? Besides, whether you are short of money or not is one thing, but whether you value it or not is another.
To a certain extent, the annual salary reflects how much the club values a player.
However, Su Dong thought of another problem.
"I want to add a special clause to the contract."
(End of this chapter)
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