Enrique Riquelme used a high-profile television appearance to outline a transfer plan that included Ra\u00fal Gonz\u00e1lez as his chosen manager, Rodri as a target and Erling Haaland as the marquee signing. He also offered a public forfeit: if elected and he failed to deliver those signings, he would pay the membership fees of every Real Madrid fan from his own funds, a sum estimated at about $23.3 million (\u20ac20 million).<\/p>\n
The declarations triggered almost immediate rebuttals. A statement from Haaland’s father, Alfie, and agent, Rafaela Pimenta, read, \u201cAll very entertaining but not true,\u201d and \u201cWe wish all the best for both candidates in the Real Madrid elections.\u201d Manchester City moved quickly to deny any contractual basis for Riquelme’s claim. \u201cThe stories which have emerged from Spain regarding the future of Erling Haaland are false,\u201d the club said. \u201cThere is no chance of this happening and there is no contractual clause to enable it. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe are considering legal action for the use of our player image in this context.\u201d The club also highlighted that Haaland has a contract at Manchester City stretching until 2034.<\/p>\n
The episode revived a familiar comparison with the 2000 election when Florentino P\u00e9rez used Lu\u00eds Figo’s name during his campaign. Then, as now, there were public denials before a transfer eventually took place. Riquelme’s pledge echoes P\u00e9rez’s earlier tactic, but advisors and representatives were not reported to have signed the kind of binding paperwork that followed the 2000 episode.<\/p>\n
Florentino P\u00e9rez responded to Riquelme’s assertions by questioning their credibility and by suggesting agents had told him Riquelme was trying to influence players. \u201cAgents are calling me and saying that Riquelme talks to players and tells them, \u2018Don\u2019t say no.\u2019 I don\u2019t believe a word he says,\u201d P\u00e9rez said to El Espa\u00f1ol. He added: \u201cEverything Riquelme says is like the TV show Everything is a Lie,\u201d and \u201cHe says he\u2019s coming to save Real Madrid and then he has to take out a loan at 54% interest for his company.\u201d<\/p>\n
The claims have left voters to judge whether Riquelme is bluffing or making enforceable promises. Legal threats and official denials have cooled the initial splash, but the episode underlines how transfer talk can shape an election campaign.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Riquelme promised signings and to pay member fees; Haaland and City deny any agreement No clause yet<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14179,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[238,969,987],"tags":[1505,983],"class_list":["post-14180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-manchester-city","category-premier-league","category-real-madrid","tag-accountability","tag-agents"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14180"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14180\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}