Florentino Pérez's rival promises to sign Erling Haaland if elected Real Madrid president
By OnzeActu · · 2 min read
A few days before the vote for the presidency of Real Madrid, Enrique Riquelme affirms on El Hormiguero that he will bring in Erling Haaland and Rodri if he is elected, arguing the existence of a clause in the Norwegian's contract. Florentino Pérez nevertheless remains the big favorite.
This weekend, Florentino Pérez and Enrique Riquelme face off in Real Madrid's first presidential election in twenty years. Pérez remains the huge favorite to be re-elected at the head of the club he has led since 2009, but Riquelme is banking on strong promises to seduce the socios before Sunday's vote.
According to comments reported by Diario AS and made on the show El Hormiguero, Riquelme assured that he would sign Erling Haaland if he became president of Real. He claims that the Norwegian striker wants to join the Madrid club and that a clause in his contract at Manchester City would make it possible to carry out the operation.
The candidate went even further, arguing that Rodri Hernández, Haaland's City teammate, would also come to Madrid if Riquelme took over as president. To reinforce his commitment, he claims to have left a personal guarantee before a notary: if his promises were not kept, he would pay the full contributions of some 100,000 members of Real.
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Riquelme said he wanted to respect the ownership of the club by its members and conceded that he did not have the long track record of Pérez as president. Despite everything, he is banking on these shock announcements to reduce the gap with the current president.
For his part, Pérez has not been idle during the campaign: his teams have reportedly closed agreements with José Mourinho, Ibrahima Konaté and Denzel Dumfries – the latter should arrive for around 20 million euros from Inter, according to the same source.
It is not unlike that Pérez himself used a promise of a spectacular transfer window when he took over as president in 2000, leading to the transfer of Luis Figo from FC Barcelona. The casting proposed by Riquelme - and the reality of a clause in Haaland's contract - remains to be verified, however, and we will have to wait for the outcome of the vote to know if these commitments will have an impact on the future of the club.
Regardless, Haaland remains a long-time target for Real Madrid, who have yet to land him. Riquelme says he is confident of being the man capable of achieving this transfer, but his election and the realization of these promises remain uncertain.