14/11/2024–|Last updated: 11/14/202404:34 PM (Mecca time)
Football contracts are becoming increasingly complex, with specific demands and clauses that go beyond just transfer fees and wages. Some of them even included strange items that might not occur to you.
The club will often have specific demands for the player they sign that go beyond just the issue of the salary that must be agreed upon.
Some of the most bizarre items in the game’s history include learning a foreign language, personal requests such as private jets, lessons to improve his wife’s cooking skills, and two nights out.
The “Give Me Sport” website highlighted some of the most strange items in football history:
- Argentine Lionel Messi (item of integration into Catalan society and culture)
After Messi’s stunning contract was leaked, it emerged that there was a clause stating that he must “integrate into Catalan society and culture”.
After the 2022 World Cup winner in Qatar signed one of the biggest contracts in the history of the sport, Barcelona did its best to improve the Argentine’s Catalan language.
- Brazilian Neymar (Visiting Friends Clause)
When Barcelona signed Neymar from Santos in 2013, the Spanish club did not want him to feel nostalgic for his native Brazil, so they agreed to a visiting friends clause in the Brazilian star’s contract.
Neymar was happy to have a group of his close Brazilian friends, which he called “The TIOSS”, as they were flown to Barcelona once every two weeks, with the club paying for the expensive trips.
- Japanese Keisuke Honda (armored vehicle item)
In January 2020, Japanese legend Keisuke Honda signed with Brazilian club Botafogo.
Before moving to Brazil, the midfielder feared for his safety in Rio de Janeiro, which is considered one of the most dangerous cities in the world, and requested a personal armored vehicle, and the team was forced to accept his request, but Honda moved to another club in the same year.
- Dutchman Dennis Bergkamp (no air travel clause)
During his time at Arsenal, striker Bergkamp made sure to include a ‘no plane’ clause in his contract due to his fear of flying.
The Dutchman missed several European away matches with Arsenal as a result, and his condition initially cost him $127,000 from his personal bank balance.
Fortunately, he was a great player and the club agreed to his requests to use other means of transportation instead of flying.
- Brazilian Ronaldinho (dancing item in a club)
After the end of Ronaldinho’s trip in Europe and his return to Flamengo, the Brazilian star stipulated that his club allow him to go out dancing in a nightclub at least twice a week, without imposing any penalty on him, and he made sure that this was written in the contract.
- Cameroonian Samuel Eto’o (private plane item)
Cameroonian Samuel Eto’o was keen to travel by private plane when he was with Russia’s Anji, so that he could stay in Moscow and travel to the training headquarters every day.
- Italian Mario Balotelli (good behavior clause)
When he returned to the English Premier League, his contract with Liverpool stipulated a “good behaviour” clause, to ensure that his antics would not be repeated.
- Dutch van der Vaart (red color item)
There was intense competition between the two poles of Andalusia, Real Betis and Sevilla, to sign the former Dutch player, and in the year he spent at Real Betis (2015-2016), the administration decided to close the door on any strife and required the player to wear any sports shoes he wanted, provided that they were not red. the color.
Red is the dominant color on the logo of Seville, which competes with Real Betis in the Andalusia region.
- Italian Moise Kean (agricultural plow item)
Kane signed a professional contract in June 2017 with Juventus, but the negotiations went through their most difficult moments when his father demanded an agricultural plow from Juventus, especially since Peoro Kane comes from the Ivory Coast and it was rumored several months before the signing that the Turinians had promised him agricultural machinery, before it was annulled. Contracting at the time due to budget shortages.
- England’s Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain (20-minute mark)
Arsenal fans were very angry about Chamberlain’s lack of participation with the team, since his arrival to the Gunners from Southampton in the summer of 2011.
Frenchman Arsene Wenger, the former Arsenal coach, used to include Chamberlain as a substitute by the 71st minute or later.
It later became clear that the London club had placed a penalty clause in Chamberlain’s contract, granting his former club, Southampton, an amount of $12,000 for every 20 minutes the player played in an Arsenal shirt.
- German Giuseppe Reina (home clause)
German striker Giuseppe Reina stipulated that his club, Arminia Bielefeld, build a property for him for every year of his contract.
The club agreed to the clause, but since the clause was not specific, especially regarding the size or type of property they used that to their advantage and built him 3 Lego houses for the 3 years of his contract.
- Congolese Rolf-Christelle Joy-Maine (Cooking Skills item)
When he joined the German club Eintracht Frankfurt in 1999, Congolese midfielder Rolf Christel Gui-Maine stipulated that a strange clause be placed in his contract that included giving his wife cooking lessons.
The midfielder insisted that the advances in his wife’s cooking skills would allow him to settle into the German lifestyle much easier.
