The club World Cup turns the transfer market upside down with ever new absurdities. Leroy Sané’s farewell to FC Bayern is a symbol.
Julian Buhl reports on the club World Cup in the USA
It was a farewell in flip-flops and with symbolic power: After the 4-2 victory of FC Bayern against Flamengo, Leon Goretzka, Manuel Neuer and also sports director Max Eberl had come to the reporters in the belly of the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami to talk about the quarter-finals at the club World Cup. At the very end, one stepped into the interview zone, which was about something personal: Leroy Sané, who had just played his last game for Bayern as a change player.
The 29-year-old did not want to take his farewell from the record champion to Galatasaray Istanbul again. In red and white striped Bayern bathing clapes, on which his rear number 10 was scribbled on handwritten, he put himself on the podium in front of the built-in microphone. The national player chose emotional words: he would miss his teammates, said Sané, who had moved to Munich for almost 50 million euros five years ago. (Read more about this here).
Sané’s farewell on Sunday evening became a symbol of a bigger problem: The club World Cup completely messes up the transfer market and presents the clubs before unknown, curious challenges.
In the case of Sané, these look like this: his contract with Bayern ran until June 30th. So he was still available to the Munich team at the club World Cup until then and including the round of 16. From July 1st, he has now signed a working paper at Galatasaray. So he said goodbye to his old teammates in the Bayern camp in Orlando on Monday. They must now contest the quarter-finals against Paris Saint-Germain on July 5.
When Sané was asked in the arena in Miami whether he would also receive a winning medal, provided that Bavaria would now win the club World Cup without him, he had to laugh out loud. “It is a bit special with the tournament that you can no longer finish it,” he said. But he really enjoyed it to “be able to stand on the pitch” again with the “boys”. They are a “special group, one unit”.
At the beginning of the tournament, the club World Cup had mixed up the transfers of the clubs. In order to be able to contest the preliminary round and the round of 16 of the tournament in June with new signing Jonathan Tah, Bayern had to transfer 800,000 euros to its ex-club Leverkusen. Even though Tah’s free transfer to Munich was already decided on July 1st. By June 30, however, he was still under contract in Leverkusen. Depending on the performance of Bayern at the club World Cup, the transfer fee could increase to just under two million euros due to agreed bonus payments.