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AS Monaco Thread
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matrix0161
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matrix said:
Monaco break the bank with £110m spree and send out warning to Europe's giants
In the money: Atletico Madrid striker Radamel Falcao is close to a £51 million move to Monaco
By Oliver Brown11:00PM BST 28 May 2013
It is the great paradox of AS Monaco that a club poised to sign Radamel Falcao, the continent’s most coveted player, are still theoretically banned from competing in the French top flight.
So the astonishing outbreak of kleptomania on the Côte d’Azur, with Falcao on the cusp of joining James Rodríguez and Joao Moutinho as the latest marquee Monégasque name, can only be construed as a £110 million act of defiance that could yet redraw the contours of the European game.
Falcao was understood to be undergoing his medical on Tuesday night, bringing to fruition a once-outlandish rumour that a striker of his sophistication could ever be tempted to grace a club only just promoted from France’s second tier, who would struggle to draw a crowd in five figures.
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But as if majority owner Dmitry Rybolovlev had not been extravagant enough in his largesse, seeking to prise the Colombian from Atletico Madrid for £51 million, the Russian oligarch has also persuaded Barcelona goalkeeper Victor Valdes to follow suit to cement his ominous declaration of intent.
Ricardo Carvalho also joined Monaco on Tuesday on a one-year deal with the option of a further year. The former Portugal and Chelsea defender, 35, will be out of contract at Real Madrid at the end of this season.
“We want to build a beautiful team who play beautiful football,” Vadim Vasilyev, Monaco’s sporting director, explained. While the ambition might sound noble, the more complex reality is that for all the club’s lavish expenditure, they contribute so little to French tax revenues that the national federation is still struggling to resolve the ensuing ethical dilemma.
Although Chelsea and Manchester City have aroused much gnashing of teeth in the Premier League by their gaudy spraying of cash, Monaco are cast as pariahs in the French system for the fact that they are based in a tax haven.
Such status might be the principality’s historic prerogative, but for clubs across the border saddled with mounting financial demands it is perceived as a grotesque injustice. An ultimatum for Monaco to change their tax rules or forfeit their place in Ligue 1 next season has been softened to a demand to pay £170 million over seven years to encourage aggrieved rivals to withdraw their objections.
The consequence, as the questions over Falcao’s imminent transfer illustrate, is an unseemly impasse. Monaco’s fundamental attraction to a player of his talent – paying next to no income tax on a salary in excess of £250,000 a week – might be the same that has enticed a legion of Formula One drivers and tennis players to this stretch of the Riviera, but it leaves the club in danger of being ostracised.
Rybolovelev and his advisers are refusing to yield, choosing to address their treatment to France’s Supreme Court on the grounds that it violates a 50-year-old Franco-Monégasque tax convention, and are wary of speaking publicly for fear of inflaming the legal situation.
A Monaco source told Telegraph Sport: “We have always considered ourselves part of the family of French football, and we have developed some of the great players that have graced the French national team, such as Thierry Henry, David Trezeguet and Manuel Amoros.
“So to have this decision imposed on us by the authorities without any consultation, at a time when we are making investments that most probably will have a positive influence on all French football, is very disappointing. It threatens the very future of Monaco and that is why we will continue to contest it vigorously.”
The invoking of such figures as Henry and Trezeguet underlines how Monaco are no arrogant arrivistes, in the manner of which Paris Saint-Germain and their Qatari backers have lately been accused. Where PSG only came into being in 1970, Monaco were founded 89 years ago and have since garnered seven league titles, not to mention reaching a Champions League final.
They maintain that they are committed to nurturing young French stars as well as highly priced foreign imports, and claim that they would never pay above market value.
But another uneasy issue hovers over their manoeuvres, in the form of the Portuguese super-agent Jorge Mendes.
Not only does Mendes represent Falcao, he also partially owns the 27-year-old under the controversial third-party ownership rules more commonplace in South America. Rodríguez, Moutinho and Valdes are also, it might not be surprising to learn in a Monaco saga that begins and ends with money, all Mendes clients, too.
Ifwecouldjust.......
Well-Known Member
Falcao has signed for Monaco
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Anonymous
Guest
lololololol
fuck off platini you bent fucker!!!
fuck off platini you bent fucker!!!
laserblue
Well-Known Member
Keep spending Monaco. Keep spending until Platini has to fashion the FFPR regulations into a conical shape and shove them up his arse.
psg and the qataris wont like monaco giving it the un..spend spend spend buy buy buy ya french cunts..laters twatini and ffplaserblue said:Keep spending Monaco. Keep spending until Platini has to fashion the FFPR regulations into a conical shape and shove them up his arse.
M18CTID
Well-Known Member
Ha ha - the more French clubs that ride completely roughshod over the FFP regs the better as it takes the spotlight away from us. Platini would be loathe to ban any French club from European competition so it plunges into further doubt the threat of sanctions against clubs from other countries.
As for Platini himself, I'm going to don my tin hat. IMO he's been caught between a rock and a hard place with FFP. This is clearly being driven by the so-called elite clubs of Europe and he has little choice but to dance to their tune because, like it or not, it's the clubs that hold the power and not UEFA.
While I'm hardly a fan of Platini's, I reckon that off the record he's quite impressed with what we're doing as a club. He alluded briefly to this in that car crash of an interview with Martin Samuel. His attitude towards us has clearly softened somewhat but there's no way he'd ever make a point of seriously bigging us up as that would piss off the likes of Bayern, United, etc, no end and that's the last thing that he (and UEFA) would want.
As for Platini himself, I'm going to don my tin hat. IMO he's been caught between a rock and a hard place with FFP. This is clearly being driven by the so-called elite clubs of Europe and he has little choice but to dance to their tune because, like it or not, it's the clubs that hold the power and not UEFA.
While I'm hardly a fan of Platini's, I reckon that off the record he's quite impressed with what we're doing as a club. He alluded briefly to this in that car crash of an interview with Martin Samuel. His attitude towards us has clearly softened somewhat but there's no way he'd ever make a point of seriously bigging us up as that would piss off the likes of Bayern, United, etc, no end and that's the last thing that he (and UEFA) would want.
Matty
Well-Known Member
I don't have a problem with Monaco spending big money on players, if their owner wants to do that then that's his choice and I don't believe FFP should prevent it, with the caveat that he is turnign the money spent into equity and not loading it onto the club as a debt they need to pay him.
My issue is the Monaco tax situation. Monaco has negligible tax, whereas France has a 75% tax rate for its highest earners. This means that Marseille for example would have to spend a vast amount of money on wages in order to give a player the same take home pay as one who plays for Monaco. Now, that's an issue with FFP across the different leagues in Europe anyway (French tax is different to English tax, which in turn is different to Spanish tax) but those issues are exacerbated when it affects different teams within the same domestic competition.
My issue is the Monaco tax situation. Monaco has negligible tax, whereas France has a 75% tax rate for its highest earners. This means that Marseille for example would have to spend a vast amount of money on wages in order to give a player the same take home pay as one who plays for Monaco. Now, that's an issue with FFP across the different leagues in Europe anyway (French tax is different to English tax, which in turn is different to Spanish tax) but those issues are exacerbated when it affects different teams within the same domestic competition.