The God of Football Starts With Passive Skills-Chapter 203 - 59: Mr. Clutch! A Historic Final! Mainz’s Big Trouble! What a Bountiful Season
"One million."
Strutz sputtered, turning to Heidel in disbelief. "One million? RMB?"
"Euros!"
"My god, you couldn’t get that much even if you sold me."
"We’ve never won the Bundesliga or the DFB-Pokal. Who could have imagined this?" Heidel was also at a loss for words.
He couldn’t just run out and tell the players, ’Hey, how about we don’t win the title?’
That would be even more absurd, wouldn’t it?
Besides, winning the title comes with hefty prize money.
"What about the Champions League and the UEFA Europa League?"
"Champions League is 500,000. UEFA Europa League is 300,000."
Strutz paced back and forth in the office, unable to stay still.
This meant that based on the future he had just promised in the locker room—winning the DFB-Pokal and qualifying for the Champions League—the club would have to pay out 1.5 million euros in bonuses to Wang Shuo alone.
’Dear God, what kind of cosmic joke is this?’
But could you really blame Heidel for this?
Not at all!
At the time, giving Wang Shuo an annual salary of 800,000 euros really wasn’t that high.
That’s what Subotic was making.
And look at Subotic now—he moved to Dortmund, and his salary doubled instantly.
’If there’s anyone to blame, it’s that Mainz is just too poor!’
"So, Christian, tell me, for the DFB-Pokal final, do you want us to win or lose now?"
Strutz looked at Heidel, speechless. 𝒇𝓻𝓮𝓮𝙬𝙚𝒃𝒏𝓸𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝓬𝓸𝒎
’At least the runner-up bonus is only half, which is a small relief.’
Heidel thought for a moment, then said with a wry smile, "Win, of course!"
It was a bittersweet feeling.
"And the Champions League or UEFA Europa League?"
"We definitely have to qualify. If we make it to the Champions League group stage, we’ll get at least ten or twenty million euros. We can rent a stadium from Frankfurt to play our Champions League matches then."
Why?
Bigger capacity means more ticket sales.
Bundesliga ticket prices are regulated, but Champions League prices aren’t.
Of course, that’s all assuming we can make it to the group stage.
The 3rd place team in the Bundesliga has to go through a playoff. If we don’t advance to the group stage, the benefits are much smaller.
"How many other players on our team have these kinds of title bonus clauses and Champions League/UEFA Europa League clauses?"
"A few have title clauses, like Hainauer, but his bonus isn’t high. Only Wang Shuo has the Champions League and UEFA Europa League clauses."
As Heidel said this, a bitter, miserable smile spread across his face.
"I secretly had someone run the numbers. There’s no way we can afford to pay Wang Shuo’s bonus."
Can’t afford it?
So what do we do?
We’ll just owe it to him for now!
"Have any teams made an offer for Wang Shuo recently?" Strutz asked, concerned.
’If we sell him and get the transfer fee, we’ll have the money, right?’
"Yes."
"How are the offers?"
"Not high. You know how the Bundesliga’s purchasing power is right now."
Strutz was getting frustrated. "What about Bayern?"
"Bayern has been in touch. Hennes started with an offer of 5 million euros, which went up to 10 million during the winter break. Now it’s at 15 million, and he refuses to go any higher."
"Hennes said this would already break the Bundesliga transfer fee record for a U23 player."
Currently, the record for the highest transfer fee for a player under 23 in the Bundesliga is held by the Czech player, Thomas Rosicky.
He joined Dortmund in January 2001, costing the Bumblebees 14.5 million euros.
Bayern?
The highest Bayern ever paid for a player under 20 was just in ’08, for the Brazilian center-back Bruno, which cost them 8 million euros.
When it comes to being shrewd and squeezing other German clubs, Bayern has always been a master.
Their specialty is convincing a player to demand a transfer, then using the situation to drive down the price and force the other club to yield.
The Bundesliga hegemon’s move was tried and true.
Sometimes they even manage to get them on a free transfer.
Strutz felt like tearing his hair out.
Everything that was happening was technically a good thing, yet it all felt completely wrong.
The more he thought, the more his face twisted into the same pained, constipated expression as Heidel’s.
...
「Bundesliga, Matchday 31.」
As the season neared its end, the competition between the teams grew increasingly fierce.
Bayer Leverkusen drew 2-2 at home against Bielefeld.
In that match, Friedrich scored an own goal.
Bayern, on the other hand, defeated Cottbus 3-1 away from home.
This round, VfL Wolfsburg lost 1-4 away to Stuttgart.
Mario Gomez scored four goals.
The German native center-forward was now dead set on joining Bayern, but Bayern was unwilling to pay a high price for Gomez and was constantly haggling with Stuttgart.
Besides, Bayern already had forwards like Luca Tony, Klose, and Podolski.
Therefore, Gomez was playing with extra determination, hoping to convince Bayern with his improved performance.
As for Dortmund, they defeated Kaiserslautern 4-0 at home this round.
However, after the big home victory, head coach Christopher Dom announced early on that he would be leaving Dortmund at the end of the season to coach Fenerbahce in Turkey.
According to reports from the German media, the reason Dom chose to leave, besides his conflicts with Dortmund’s management, was more importantly that the salary offered by Fenerbahce was far higher than what Dortmund was paying.
Dom’s move also caused strong dissatisfaction among Dortmund’s fans.
After all, the Bumblebees’ performance this season hadn’t been particularly outstanding.
This round, Mainz played away against Hoffenheim.
The two struggling teams ultimately ended the match in a 1-1 draw.
In the 68th minute of the second half, Demba Ba scored for Hoffenheim.
But in the 79th minute, Wang Shuo scored the equalizer for Mainz, assisted by Hainauer.
Both teams were pretty much evenly matched, each with about 60 minutes of stamina.
After 60 minutes?
It was every man for himself!
Hertha Berlin defeated Bochum 2-0 at home.
