Gerard Pique and Luis Rubiales. /
According to ‘El Confidencial’, the Barcelona footballer’s company agreed with the Federation to pay 24 million for brokering the agreement to take the tournament to Riyadh
Every year that the Spanish Super Cup is played in Saudi Arabia, it is a great deal not only for the Spanish Football Federation (this was confirmed by its own president, Luis Rubiales), but also for Barcelona footballer Gerard Piqué and his company Kosmos. As published this Monday by ‘El Confidencial’, the Federation agreed with Piqué’s company, Kosmos, a commission of 24 million euros for the six editions that the competition takes place in Riyadh, more than 6,500 kilometers from Spain.
The intermediation of the Catalan athlete in said operation was well known, but it was unknown how much a possible commission was calculated, which according to the medium that has published the information and that has provided audios of both parties, amounts to approximately 10% of the 40 million that the Saudis pay each year to celebrate the ‘final four’ of the Spanish tournament in Riyadh. The contract between both parties imposes that ‘fee’, or fees, per year to be paid to the intermediary company, in this case, Kosmos.
The beginning of the operation dates back to 2018, when the then president of the Federation, Luis Rubiales, and Gerard Piqué begin to talk about a change in format in the Super Cup and the tracking of the second option to sell the rights to the competition begins. and being able to get more out of it with a four-team final format.
In the audios provided by ‘El Confidencial’, even in those early days, there was talk of how to convince Real Madrid to hold the tournament at the Camp Nou. “I think that Madrid is going to say no to me. As Madrid is going to say no to me, that comes from hell to justify us for the future and we say that (the Camp Nou) is the stadium with the most capacity, that (Barcelona) is the champion of the League, that it is the Cup champion or Cup finalist… I think we have legitimacy,” Rubiales explained to Piqué.
“Congratulations Gery…”
As 2019 advanced, those contacts continued but they focused on taking the competition to Saudi Arabia and negotiations with Riyadh began. In fact, in some audios it is Piqué himself who explains to Rubiales what the commissions proposed by the Saudis are like. “Rubi, he is referring not to the fact that you pay the commission,” the Barcelona center-back detailed in an audio.
An agreement was finally reached with Saudi Arabia for the dispute in Riyadh for six years of the Super Cup. An exultant Rubiales communicates the agreement reached to Gerard Piqué in another audio: «Geri, congratulations. And I’m not referring to yesterday’s great game or your goal. I mean that it is already after 12 o’clock and therefore the agreement with Saudi Arabia is already firm. A hug, thanks for everything and here I am for whatever you need.(…) Take good care of yourself, my friend”, Rubiales tells him.
