If you’ve just woken up, you may have missed the news that Manchester United have broken the world transfer record to sign Paul Pogba.
The final fee has been reported as £89m – a huge sum by anyone’s estimation. But we wanted to put United’s expenditure in a greater context.
Much has been made of the fee being ‘affordable’ by virtue of it representing only a small percentage of the club’s annual turnover.
That turnover comes via a number of high-profile off-field partnerships, as well as boring everyday things like ticket and shirt sales.
We’ve gone down the educational route, letting you know more about United’s brand partners while also revealing how much of their signature products you could buy for £89m.
Now, we’re ignoring any mates’ rates United might get, or any bulk-buying discounts, but we still think it’s a fair representation.
We have stuck to values in pounds sterling, because that is what Pogba (and his agent Mino Raiola) have been paid in, presumably. Look, either way they are minted.
For £89m you could buy stadium tours for the entire adult population of the Dominican Republic (an estimated 4.94m people), at £18 a pop.
Clive Brunskill/Getty Images
You could buy a personalised replica shirt for every person, adult or child, in Equatorial Guinea (1.22m people), and still have a wad of cash left over (£71.95 for short sleeve with name and number).
POGBA
6#POGBACK pic.twitter.com/J8zPNn3Y2N
— Manchester United (@ManUtd) August 9, 2016
You could buy a ‘Big United Mixed Grill’ from the club’s Red Cafe (£15.95) for every single person in Singapore (5.535m)
Brendon Thorne/Getty Images
You could pick up 1,012 Corvette Z06s from United’s shirt sponsor Chevrolet if you stick to the basic specifications (£87,860 each), with enough left over to jazz up a few of them.
Scott Olson/Getty Images
You could have made The Martian, the 2015 film from Manchester United’s official feature film partner (£83.2m), and still had a few million left over
Here's the teaser poster for Ridley Scott's THE MARTIAN starring Matt Damon #TheMartian pic.twitter.com/5LbYCOFgtl
— The Movie Waffler 🎬 (@themoviewaffler) June 8, 2015
And finally, you could buy enough ingredients for Aperol Spritz – United’s official global spirits partner – to quench the thirst of Croatia several times over (more than 4.3m bottles of Aperol, Prosecco and Soda Water).
Cindy Ord/Getty Images
So, when you bear all that in mind, was Paul Pogba really worth all that money?
Probably, yeah.
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