By now, it is clear that the men in charge of Bayern Munich’s summer transfer window have grand plans in store.
How grand those plans are has always been the question, one which Christian Falk and Tobi Altschäffl have attempted to answer. According to them, as captured by @iMiaSanMia, “[Director of Sport] Max Eberl’s transfer plan for this summer, which he had approved by the supervisory board, costs around €200m.”
But…because there is always a but… “the condition is that Eberl has to refinance around half of it through player sales. With the signings of Hiroki Itō and Michael Olise, Eberl has so far spent €73.5m. There have been no player sales so far.”
So…was the sale of Malik Tillman to PSV Eindhoven just a mass hallucination? Still, this idea certainly plays into the narrative of Bayern wanting to sell players in order to finance further spending. Yet we all know that financial transactions in football are never as simple as counting up the transfer fees, as agent fees and signing on bonuses and payment structures all come into play. To be generous, let us assume Falk and co. are trying to give the simple version of the story. Because, if they are right, Bayern might have hit a financial wall in their summer pursuits.
Another report by Sport Bild, again captured by @iMiaSanMia, claims that Bayern do not “want to pay no more than €25m for Jonathan Tah and €46m for João Palhinha.” Meanwhile, the fact that the plan for Xavi Simons is to initially sign him on loan helps Eberl maneuver within these confines, though Bayern’s bosses would only agree to a Simons move if there were a fixed option to buy.
If the first report is to be believed, Bayern’s board would not authorize a Palhinha signing without further sales. Ergo, expect many, many dominoes to start falling in Munich in the next weeks.
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