Every morning, the small business owners of Spain are peering into the pages of Marca and AS to discover if Alvaro Negredo has decided that Hull CityâÂÂs for him or if Aston Villa are willing to stump up the cash for pocket-rocket, Wesley Sneijder.
After all, these two transfers are the last, best hope for the countryâÂÂs struggling entrepreneurs of making it through the summer in these terribly tough financial times.
La Liga Loca suspects that SpainâÂÂs banks had to hand over every spare cent to fund Real MadridâÂÂs quarter-of-a-billion-euro splurge on their fancy-pants footballers.
And thatâÂÂs even taking into account the â¬90 million that ex-prez Ramón Calderón claims he left in the clubâÂÂs kitty before stepping down to spent a lot of time in court.
Of course, that figure may have been a little higher had the club not had to pay off members of staff who were forced to quit having been accused of vote-rigging at the clubâÂÂs AGM back in December.
However, El PaÃÂs is just one of the papers who report that the plan hatched in Castle Greyskull was to sell a good â¬100 million worth of unwanted wasters - mainly of the Dutch variety - to start paying back the insane sums that had been borrowed.
Funds that may in turn be lent to the good, good, people of Spain who actually need it, as opposed to an ego-bursting club president who simply wants to be adored.
However, not everything has gone to plan in the Spanish capital with a rather limp and droopy â¬32 million or so having been raised so far, instead.
Javier Saviola moved to Benfica for â¬5 million (much of which went to pay off his contract). The same club also stumped up â¬7 million for Javi GarcÃÂa.
Dani Parejo joined Getafe for â¬3 million, Heinze joined Marseille for â¬1.5 million and Klaas-Jan Huntelaar hooked up with AC Milan for â¬15 million after escaping from a packing crate stamped with the destination âÂÂStuttgartâÂÂ.
The problem with that final deal is that, according to Marca, â¬7 million must be paid to Ajax as part of the agreement negotiated by Ramón Calderón during the purchase of the player last December.
In one of the worst football transfers ever, a striker who cost â¬20 million has been sold for â¬8 million some eight months later. And couldnâÂÂt be used in the Champions League, either.
But Huntelaar is unique in being the only âÂÂTulipâ - as the Spanish press call those coming from Holland - who moved from the Bernabeu.
As WednesdayâÂÂs Marca complains, âÂÂthe Dutchmen refuse to leaveâ with a picture of Robben, Sneijder, Drenthe, Van der Vaart and Van Nistelrooy on the front cover and all looking very comfortable indeed, thank you very much.
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