LaLiga is at stake

Under a climate of high tension, the Assembly of Spanish professional football made up of the 42 First and Second Division clubs will vote this morning whether to approve an injection of 2,688 million euros from the CVC investment fund in exchange for 10.95% of the LaLiga profits for the next 50 years. The operation has met with strong opposition from Barcelona and Real Madrid, who on Tuesday announced legal measures against Javier Tebas, president of the employer, the head of the fund, Javier de Jaime, and against CVC. For opponents of the agreement, the amount to be received by the clubs is less than what could be obtained. For LaLiga and most of its affiliates, those 2.688 million euros are a fair valuation and a ball of oxygen that will allow the individual growth of the clubs and therefore the value of the competition in the future. For the agreement to be ratified, 33 favorable votes are needed, a figure that the employers take for granted.

“The agreement is good. Even after the fifth year we could buy back what we have sold to CVC, but we are not interested because it is an excellent travel companion for the future that will help us grow digitally due to its roots in this sector. He has more than 25 years of experience in investing in high-level sports such as Formula 1 ”, they maintain from the employer's association. If the vote is positive, the clubs will have a line of credit on those 2,688 million euros at low interest for forty years. According to the calculation made according to the distribution for television rights between 2016 and 2020, Barcelona would receive 253 million; Real Madrid, 241; Atlético, 181; Sevilla, 119 and the least, Elche, 10. 70% of these amounts should go to infrastructure. "For instance,it will allow Sevilla to remodel its stadium and access higher ticket income and Valencia to be able to finish the new field that has been standing still for years ”, abound in LaLiga. The clubs defend that in view of the depreciation of the television rights of the Premier or the Bundesliga, the alliance with CVC is seeking to invest in the business to strengthen it and not lose value and that for this reason the finalist character of 70% has been exploited of money for infrastructure. 15% is used to refinance debt or offset losses and only the remaining 15% could be used to enroll players.The clubs defend that in view of the depreciation of the television rights of the Premier or the Bundesliga, the alliance with CVC is seeking to invest in the business to strengthen it and not lose value and that for this reason the finalist character of 70% has been exploited of money for infrastructure. 15% is used to refinance debt or offset losses and only the remaining 15% could be used to enroll players.The clubs defend that in view of the depreciation of the television rights of the Premier or the Bundesliga, the alliance with CVC is seeking to invest in the business to strengthen it and not lose value and that for this reason the finalist character of 70% has been exploited of money for infrastructure. 15% is used to refinance debt or offset losses and only the remaining 15% could be used to enroll players.

More information

• CVC, the fund that multiplied by seven its investment in Moto GP

• The Spanish Football Federation opposes the LaLiga-CVC pact

However, the benefits of the pact that LaLiga proclaims not only do not satisfy Real Madrid and Barcelona. The civil war environment surrounding the vote was joined by the Spanish Federation on Wednesday with a statement in which it crossed out the agreement as "illegal" and also threatened to take legal action against LaLiga. “The RFEF must also warn that it is not going to allow the contribution to modest football that comes from these audiovisual rights to be reduced during those fifty years. Royal Decree Law 5/2015 established a very beneficial centralized marketing model for the LNFP, establishing controls and mandatory contributions for certain purposes. If the LNFP now intends to bypass the controls and reduce the contributions required by the Royal Decree Law,The RFEF will be obliged to take the appropriate legal actions to defend its rights and those of non-professional football. At this point, it should be remembered that the Higher Sports Council would find itself in the same situation as the RFEF ”, the federative letter read. From an economic point of view, the federation also sees "terrible and regrettable for the future of Spanish football and, on the other hand, fantastic for a fund and other possible beneficiaries". The federative text even argues that Tebas has the legal capacity to reach the agreement that it has closed with CVC: “If there are clubs that, with their inalienable and unavailable rights by third parties, want to borrow voluntarily, there is no problem in doing so, both if the market conditions are considered usurious,but not by means of an illegal agreement that obliges everyone, by means of the false attribution in favor of the rights that it does not possess ”.

Frontism

The battle of communiqués and counter-communiqués is a classic in the endless internal wars that Spanish football has suffered in recent years. Shortly after the federation's statement, the LaLiga reply emerged, which described the federative note as "inconsistent, false and subjective." The body headed by Tebas ensures that the body chaired by Luis Rubiales had access "to the full documentation of the operation with full transparency" and that "it did not express disagreement or opposition." In addition, the employer added that “it has worked with numerous candidates and CVC is the best possible industrial partner both for the attractive valuation at which the operation is carried out and for its successful experience in the sports rights sector. It is the largest sports investment fund in the world.The consideration of an insignificant amount of money is not understood before an operation whose valuation is equivalent to 15.1 times the

in the last season, and which far exceeds that which has been considered in similar projects ”. And on a possible reduction in the federation's income due to the commercialization of the television rights of Spanish professional football, LaLiga was forceful: “The project in no way forgets non-professional football, on the contrary, since it has objectives to allocate certain amounts (96 million euros) through the CSD and the RFEF itself, thus reinforcing the solidarity measures already legally envisaged. In addition to the fact that the promoted clubs, contrary to what was stated by the RFEF, far from seeing their income reduced, will see a substantial increase in them ”.

The alignment of both sides is another classic of the Spanish football front.

Real Madrid, Barcelona and the federation make up a powerful triple alliance that is directly opposed to all the projects in which LaLiga is embarking.

On the other side, Javier Tebas and most of the clubs that support him are battling against what they consider unsupportive positions of the two greats of Spanish football to prevent their growth and refer to the attempt to create the Super League and the boycott of the agreement with CVC as two glaring examples.

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