Football finance expert Kieran Maguire has been discussing the clauses in Manchester United’s deal to sign Bruno Fernandes.
During the January transfer window, the Red Devils sealed the arrival of the Portuguese midfielder from Sporting Lisbon after paying an initial €55m (£47m) fee which could rise to €80m (£67.7m) with add-ons (per BBC).
Since his arrival at Old Trafford, the 25-year-old middleman has made 13 appearances in the Premier League in which he has scored seven goals and bagged seven assists (per WhoScored).
So, in the latest episode of The Price of Football podcast, Maguire discussed the clauses which Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s outfit would now be forking out for.
He said: “The base fee for Bruno Fernandes was €55m, but it was very much tiered towards his achievements at Manchester United. So, there’s a potential €25m [in add-ons] in total, and I think about the first tranche of that, about €8m or €9m, is now going to go to Sporting.
“And rightly so, because he has transformed their season and they look a far better team with him in it than the previous to that.
“The only downside is that I know some people in Portugal, and they say the bottom really has fallen out of the market there, and if you take a look at Portugal as a footballing country, it has a far greater proportion of players being sold to elsewhere in Europe than any other.
“He says the clubs have this as their business model and if Fernandes was being sold in the summer market [with the current global pandemic], they’d struggled to get €30-35m for him.
“So, they’re absolutely delighted that they did manage to sell him in January and they’ve reaped all this extra money.”
TIF Thoughts…
As can be seen in what Maguire had to say, it seems that Sporting Lisbon are pleased that they sold the star midfielder for the fee they did in January.
Has Bruno Fernandes been Manchester United's best signing in the last ten years?
Yes, he has been superb
No, we've had better
However, with Fernandes having picked up a stellar 7.81/10 average rating since his arrival in Manchester, which has helped propel the Red Devils into a Champions League spot, it is likely that United will care little that they could have signed him for less money in the summer.