On length of contract, Cavani and Torres

Hello all, I don't often post here as I don't have much time and many things to say that haven't already been said, though I read a lot and I agree with the article below that this should be a place primarily for debating football.

So saying that, I decided to talk about a finer aspect of transfers that I think is relatively unknown, particularly considering Chelsea are trying to buy a player who still has four years left on his contract (1). A very simple way to make quick money in football is by jumping ship regularly à la Zlatan or au Sulk (yes, I study French - I hope you lot appreciated that nerdy bit of grammar ). Legally, when a player changes club he is entitled to the remainder of his contract. It's famously difficult to find out a player's wage, but for the sake of arguing let's say Cavani is on £5.2 million a year (£100,000 a week), so were he to be sold, the contract with Napoli would only be void should be be paid this out - £5,200,000*4, which makes approximately £21 million for him and his team of backroom staff (agent, PR etc.). Usually, should the player wish to leave, he will come to an agreement with his club for a severance payment that will be significantly lower than the true figure. Perhaps transfers fall apart not because of a lack of consent to a wage cut (I'm thinking Malouda here), but rather there is no severance agreement reached between the club and the player.

Furthermore, a player can expect a signing on fee of around 10% of the transfer fee. So let's take the example of Cavani - an initial cost of £55 million will pay the buyout, but then as I said there is probably about £20 million pounds to payout if there is no severance agreement, plus £5.5 million signing on fee and with £10 million per year as new wages, pushing the cost of the transfer up to about £130 million. However, a severance package would certainly be agreed between Napoli and Cavani, bringing the price down considerably.

Finally, a note about Torres. If the player doesn't want to leave, he is holding aces. If Chelsea want him to leave they would have to pay out the rest of his contract (£170,000 a week multiplied by 52 multiplied by 3). He has already stated his desire to stay, and even if he does go Chelsea will receive close to pennies after the severance package.

Anyway, hope it was insightful and not too badly written, I'm no football journalist. Bye.


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Sources:
(1) http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2196441/Edinson-Cavani-snubs-Manchester-City-sign-new-deal-Napoli.html
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