Thiago Alcantara | Signed for Bayern Munich

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Platato said:
If you want to know why simply meeting the buyout price isn't enough when dealing with Spanish clubs, read here (The parts in bold are the most relevant.):
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Some interesting connotations there. At first glance, the bit about these buy-out clauses only applying to bids from Spain would seem to be bad news for us. But of course if you think it through, it's not that simple. Thiago's buy-out clause exists, and it is obscenely low. The first two bolded paragraphs would be of little concern to any buying club, because Thiago is comfortably worth double the £15mil stipulated in the clause. For Barcelona, probably the worst possible outcome would be if Madrid somehow bought Thiago. But if they don't give in to a foreign club (like United) meeting the buy-out clause, then Madrid have an open field to activate it.

And so we can see a situation in which United might be confident of getting Thiago at a price similar to the buy-out fee, but with room for Barca to negotiate and make it difficult for us. They can technically say 'we don't have to obey the fee if you offer it, because you aren't a Spanish club.' But realistically everyone around the table knows they would be taking a huge risk, because Thiago clearly already wants to leave despite their best efforts. Denying him the option to go to the club of his choice would only piss him off more. Refusing the buy-out from United, or demanding a significantly larger fee, leaves them open to losing the player to Madrid.

Of course, there's also the possibility that Thiago's clause is not the 'minimum requirement' one compulsory under Spanish law. After all, his is already unusual because of the playing time stipulations. It may well be one which is activated by any buying club, not just a Spanish one.
 
Why would Barca want to severe their relationship with us?

Either way if we pay 18% more on 15m GBP it's 17.7m GBP; if he needs money from us it'll be 34.1 millions. Surely we could hire a lawyer and a taxman to reduce that amount by a fir bit.
 
senorgregster said:
That doesn't make pleasant reading.
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It's nothing to worry about and has already been discussed. Barca said they'd impose the taxation laws on the transfer, which would bump the deal to 21 million euros.

Besides, as long as nobody mentions it to Barca then they'll probably forget how it works anyway, judging by the balls up they've already made with his contract.
 
Brightonian said:
Some interesting connotations there. At first glance, the bit about these buy-out clauses only applying to bids from Spain would seem to be bad news for us. But of course if you think it through, it's not that simple. Thiago's buy-out clause exists, and it is obscenely low. The first two bolded paragraphs would be of little concern to any buying club, because Thiago is comfortably worth double the £15mil stipulated in the clause. For Barcelona, probably the worst possible outcome would be if Madrid somehow bought Thiago. But if they don't give in to a foreign club (like United) meeting the buy-out clause, then Madrid have an open field to activate it.

And so we can see a situation in which United might be confident of getting Thiago at a price similar to the buy-out fee, but with room for Barca to negotiate and make it difficult for us. They can technically say 'we don't have to obey the fee if you offer it, because you aren't a Spanish club.' But realistically everyone around the table knows they would be taking a huge risk, because Thiago clearly already wants to leave despite their best efforts. Denying him the option to go to the club of his choice would only piss him off more. Refusing the buy-out from United, or demanding a significantly larger fee, leaves them open to losing the player to Madrid.

Of course, there's also the possibility that Thiago's clause is not the 'minimum requirement' one compulsory under Spanish law. After all, his is already unusual because of the playing time stipulations. It may well be one which is activated by any buying club, not just a Spanish one.
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In other words, it's simply a formality at this point. As another poster pointed out, Barca will just make us pay the extra 18 percent which isn't much.
 
pocco said:
It's nothing to worry about and has already been discussed. Barca said they'd impose the taxation laws on the transfer, which would bump the deal to 21 million euros.

Besides, as long as nobody mentions it to Barca then they'll probably forget how it works anyway, judging by the balls up they've already made with his contract.
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It was thus bit that made me flaccid, not the tax talk...
The other factor that's significant is that the buyout clause is a Spanish agreement. When it comes to international transfers -- to bids from aboard like the one supposedly from Chelsea -- it is irrelevant. Except as a symbolic price, a reference point from which you can negotiate.
 
By whatever means, we know it's nothing to worry about because a number of people within the club have made comments acknowledging their powerlessness to keep Thiago if he wants to leave.

Whether that means United will have to 'negotiate' a bit while Barca pretend that they'd be ok with giving Madrid a clear run at Thiago, or whether that means he has a proper buy-out clause rather than just the standard Spanish one (which seems the most likely, given that we already know it's got unusual playing-time stipulations), the clause is effectively working for us. Just might take a bit more back-and-forth.
 
senorgregster said:
It was thus bit that made me flaccid, not the tax talk...
The other factor that's significant is that the buyout clause is a Spanish agreement. When it comes to international transfers -- to bids from aboard like the one supposedly from Chelsea -- it is irrelevant. Except as a symbolic price, a reference point from which you can negotiate.
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I suspect that's nonsense though. Player's contracts are governed by European law. So unless the clause itself specifically stipulates only Spanish teams can activate, I don't think there can be any enforceable general policy to that effect here. There has been no indication at any point that such a clause exists.
 
Platato said:
In other words, it's simply a formality at this point. As another poster pointed out, Barca will just make us pay the extra 18 percent which isn't much.
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Even if the text I cut pasted is BS, the tax is actually 18 and additional 44%. Still not a huge deal but the price is creeping up if that is real.
 
That article overstates the hurdles. If a club doesn't want to let a player go then they can be pricks and refuse to delay thjngs while a court case occurs but that is about it. The bottom line is that VAT can be reclaimed so they are making an argument that the fee would be the buyout clause plus VAT whereas a transfer is normally negotiated as an end price including the VAT. So what? The buyout clause hasn't got a transfer to to be compared to so it isn't really an argument for or against anything. As for the stuff about the payment having to come from the player and the player would have to pay 50% tax on that sum if the buying club leant it to them as it is income then I call bullshit. If the fee turns up in Barca's account they wouldn't necessarily know where it came from so how could that hold up a transfer? And even if it did have to come from a players personal named account the buying club could lend them the cash and loans aren't income and all the would do is adjust the financial deal accordingly so that everyone got what they needed/wanted.

So assuming he wants to come and also assuming that Barca will do anything to keep him then the only real course for them is to refuse point blank and head off to court. This seems unlikely.

Of course he may want to stay anyway.
 
:lol: Check this out. The caf's very own Fadi with his own exclusive..(courtesy of thepeoplesperson.com)

EXCLUSIVE: “David De Gea told me Thiago is coming to United”

​
Thiago Alcantara is the talk of the town right now as a potential move to Manchester United grows increasingly louder with continued speculation linking him to Old Trafford.
On Wednesday, eagle eyed fans spotted that the message ‘See you in Manchester’ was scribbled on his hat-trick ball (potentially by De Gea) from the U21 final.
And now one fan, Fadi Azem, got Thiago to sign a United shirt while still out in Spain with the U21s.
So, The Peoples Person asked him just how he managed to get the 22-year-old to sign the shirt and talked about what he said.
Where did you get Thiago to sign the shirt?
I live in a place that is just 15 minutes from the hotel the Spain squad was staying in. I went to the hotel to see Thiago and De Gea. There was a security entrance but my friend works there and he let me in the back door.
Did you ask Thiago if he was joining Manchester United?
I asked him if he was going to be joining and told him that I would refresh all the sports sites every hour to find out if he had signed for United yet.
He was very happy, smiled at me and thanked me for telling him.
Did you ask De Gea any questions?
I told De Gea to keep telling Thiago to come to United. ”He will, don’t worry”, was what he said back to me.
Click to expand...
 
senorgregster said:
It was thus bit that made me flaccid, not the tax talk...
The other factor that's significant is that the buyout clause is a Spanish agreement. When it comes to international transfers -- to bids from aboard like the one supposedly from Chelsea -- it is irrelevant. Except as a symbolic price, a reference point from which you can negotiate.
Click to expand...
You missed the application of the 18%. Sid is saying the buyout clause is reference point in terms of negotiating and striking a deal. That is why if you're a foreign club, you will pay higher price.

It's getting late now. Time for bed.
 
And I'm sure contracts written in Spain aren't only valid in Spain. It sounds like the writer is confusing a legal contract with the regulations about talking to a new club before the end of a contact which vary according to where the prospective new club is.
 
senorgregster said:
Even if the text I cut pasted is BS, the tax is actually 18 and additional 44%. Still not a huge deal but the price is creeping up if that is real.
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But again, Barca really have no grounds to play hard-ball here. If they start to refuse people, or try and bump up the cost using the tax clauses, they risk both pissing Thiago off further and allowing Madrid to bid for him.

Whatever the technical ins and outs of the deal, it essentially comes down to a bit of bartering over how much tax will be paid by who. And as others have said, by far the most likely outcome is that they will simply add the 18% and leave it at that.
 
EDIT: Damn it, always beaten to the punch.

EXCLUSIVE: “David De Gea told me Thiago is coming to United”

Thiago Alcantara is the talk of the town right now as a potential move to Manchester United grows increasingly louder with continued speculation linking him to Old Trafford.
On Wednesday, eagle eyed fans spotted that the message ‘See you in Manchester’ was scribbled on his hat-trick ball (potentially by De Gea) from the U21 final.
And now one fan, Fadi Azem, got Thiago to sign a United shirt while still out in Spain with the U21s.
So, The Peoples Person asked him just how he managed to get the 22-year-old to sign the shirt and talked about what he said.
Where did you get Thiago to sign the shirt?
I live in a place that is just 15 minutes from the hotel the Spain squad was staying in. I went to the hotel to see Thiago and De Gea. There was a security entrance but my friend works there and he let me in the back door.
Did you ask Thiago if he was joining Manchester United?
I asked him if he was going to be joining and told him that I would refresh all the sports sites every hour to find out if he had signed for United yet.
He was very happy, smiled at me and thanked me for telling him.
Did you ask De Gea any questions?
I told De Gea to keep telling Thiago to come to United. ”He will, don’t worry”, was what he said back to me.
Click to expand...
 
Fadi. :lol:

I asked him if he was going to be joining and told him that I would refresh all the sports sites every hour to find out if he had signed for United yet.
Click to expand...

If this hasn't put him off United, nothing will. :lol:
 
Kid Cunto said:
Wait, what does Hunter mean by 'club to club may need work'? It's a fecking buyout clause!
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Barca will want to add taxes and all of that BS. Release clauses have changed in the way they are applied since the Figo transfer.

We may have to pay the league and steal him from Barca like Bayern did with Martinez. There's more muppetry left to go in this one.
 
I normally look to the Guardian for my footie news but they are just flat out refusing to report anything on this potential transfer. Instead they've had puff piece after puff piece on that Henrik Mickeytartaran signing for Liverfool. They even went as far as stating in an article on the best u21 team, that Thiago was set to spurn offers from Premier League clubs to stay at Barca and fight for his place.

C**ts.
 
Honestly don't think they'll put up too much of a fight. Thiago wants to leave. Barca generally have a favorable opinion of United and I think they'd rather sell to us than some other clubs in Europe if the player wants to go.

Even if we have to cough up a couple of extra million he'd still be a bargain.
 
pocco said:
A lot of Barca fans on Twitter are calling for the club to sign Isco as a replacement. Not a bad shout, though I'm not sure what sort of funds Barca have available.
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Hmmm. Thiago didn't want to be stuck behind Xavi, but Isco will be ok with being behind the younger Iniesta, and in competition meanwhile with Neymar and Fabregas? He'd be a great buy for them (or, really, for anyone), but it would be a stupid move for him.
 
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