Guest writer Iain Anderson, of Why Say Anything fame, gives his take on David De Gea’s failed transfer to Real Madrid.
Real Madrid wanted David De Gea, true or false?
Well, if you class Florentino Perez as Real Madrid then the answer is true. The problem is, it turns out, that 80% of Real Madrid supporters don’t want him due, in the main, to his association with Atletico Madrid, their bitter rivals, where he progressed through the academy to the first team and was then purchased by United. They are very happy with Keylor Navas who has made an excellent start to the season.
So what happened? Apparently a private, verbal deal has existed for months between Perez and De Gea, which states that, should he stay at United and see out his contract, Madrid would pay him a signing on fee of €xx million, as they wouldn’t have to pay a transfer fee. Although this is relatively common knowledge United still appeared relaxed about it. They would either sell him now for an acceptable fee, or run his contract down. The ball was in Madrid’s court. Did they need him now, or could they afford to wait for a season?
What people need to remember is that when all this was originally being mulled over by Perez, Keylor Navas hadn’t played a competitive game, so his suitability for Real Madrid was unknown. Perez, as usual, wanted another Galactico signing and saw just that in De Gea.
De Gea, although having played for Atletico Madrid, wanted to go home and Real Madrid were offering that option, or so it seemed.
Fast forward to transfer deadline day in Spain.
Real Madrid offer a deal for De Gea. The deal is £19 million cash plus Keylor Navas, who is valued at £11 million, meaning the total offer is £30 million. Keylor Navas is talked into going to United with the offer to double his money, (it’s amazing how successful a ploy that is). Manchester United accept the offer and everything is hunky dory.
The only problem now is that Perez is having second thoughts. Go back to my second paragraph. At this stage, 80% of Madrid fans don’t want De Gea, they want to keep Navas. Perez is about to make a very unpopular signing, the timing couldn’t be much worse.
How can he get out of this transfer and save face at the same time? How about messing up the paperwork and blaming United. Think about it. Nasty Manchester United have messed up the De Gea transfer. Perez apologises to the fans who didn’t want him anyway and Keylor Navas stays.
Bear in mind also that Madrid didn’t appeal the decision of La Liga. Why not? There has never been an appeal upheld yet so the chances are that Madrid would have failed anyway, but what if they hadn’t? What if the appeal was upheld and Perez had to sign a player he no longer wanted? He certainly didn’t want to take that chance.
Win win for Perez. If Keylor Navas doesn’t turn out to be as good as he first seems then Perez can get De Gea for no transfer fee next season. The fans are happy, they get what they wanted. Manchester United say they weren’t bothered either way, so the only unhappy parties in this farce are the two goalkeepers.
Navas is now not going to double his money and De Gea has to stay in Manchester. In theory, therefore, both clubs have an unhappy goalkeeper, not an ideal situation for the managers.
Having unhappy players never seems to have unduly bothered van Gaal and he has been playing Romero recently, so not much has changed there. Navas will probably carry on at Madrid as though nothing has happened, but inside both he and De Gea will be annoyed with the situation.
All of this could have been avoided by Madrid in one of two ways. They could either have offered the deal they finally offered much earlier and we can only assume that the transfer would have gone through. Alternatively, they could have publicly stated that they weren’t going to try and sign De Gea this season.
All of this could have been avoided by Manchester United by tying De Gea down to a new contract two years ago. That would not necessarily have meant that Madrid wouldn’t have wanted him, it would have meant they couldn’t get him on the cheap or for free.
The bottom line here is that Madrid have used United to get out of buying De Gea now and Perez has come out of the whole episode smelling of roses.
de gea should sign a new deal and play for a proper club where fans respect good team players not a micky mouse club like madrid the club is the joke of europe cant develop home grown players only buying the best players with their dirty tricks .. scumbags