Russell originally thought that Chu Zhongtian would have to think about such an important matter for several days, so he had already planned not to think about it for the past two days to avoid being distracted.

Unexpectedly, he received a call from Chu Zhongtian in just half a day.

"I think we can talk about the details of the contract, Alai."

Russell was ecstatic. He was a little impulsive when he first said that he wanted Chu Zhongtian to join, but he didn't expect that Chu Zhongtian actually agreed!

Of course, it is impossible for Chu Zhongtian to talk about the details of the contract to be between Chu Zhongtian and the head coach, but the agent went to talk to Russell. However, they could reach some consensus first, such as Russell urgently wanted to know how Chu Zhongtian asked for his annual salary - this is the most important one in the contract.

Chu Zhongtian's annual salary in Real Madrid is 8.5 million euros. If it is still the standard, Wimbledon cannot afford to sign anyway... In addition, we need to inquire about the contract. Is Chu Zhongtian planning to play here for one season, two seasons, or until his retirement?

"Chu, your annual salary..." Russell asked.

"Ah, you don't have to worry about this. I will definitely not ask for an annual salary of 8.5 million, haha!" Chu Zhongtian laughed. "What is the highest salary in the team now?"

"Well, it's Kevin Clark, a striker with a salary of 6,000 per week. He is the highest." Russell replied.

"Then I'll want 7,000 pounds, just make sure I'm the highest in the team." In fact, it's not that Chu Zhongtian cares about that thousand, but that he's still a little vanity. He thinks that he has to be the highest-paid player in the team no matter what. As his own identity, it's not an exaggeration to ask for a "highest-paid salary in the team".

Russell didn't think that Chu Zhongtian was not bad for asking for the highest salary in the team. The 7,000 pounds was much lower than Russell thought. Russell felt that even if Chu Zhongtian was willing to come, he would have to pay a weekly salary of 20,000 or 30,000... Unexpectedly, it was only 7,000... Wimbledon could afford such a small amount of money.

The salary is affordable, and the biggest obstacle to Chu Zhongtian joining the team is cleared.

"Where is the contract period, Chu?"

Russell asked again.

"Well... I think about it, how about signing for four years?"

"Four years?" Russell was startled by Chu Zhongtian's words.

On June 30 next year, the contract between Real Madrid and Chu Zhongtian will expire. Chu Zhongtian will be 34 years old by then. By then, the contract will be 38 years old in four years, and there will be 39 in half a year... At such an old age, Chu Zhongtian can really play on the court? You must know that the intensity of the Championship is no less than that of the most intense football league in the world.

So Russell was surprised.

"Yes, four years. I think I can play high-level football for at least four years." Chu Zhongtian said before that he could play for two to three years, so why has it changed for another four years? Because he thinks that the level of the English Championship is lower. If he plays for the English Championship, there will be no problem for him for four years. During these four years, he has worked hard to help the team advance to the Premier League.

"But you were nearly thirty-nine years old at that time..."

"Stanley Matthews won the European Footballer when he was 41 years old. When he was 51 years old, he led his hometown team Stoke City to the First Division. I think it's not too strange that I can play for at least 40, right?" Chu Zhongtian gave Russell an example of his predecessors.

"There were not as many games at that time as it is now..."

"Hey, Alai. Do you want me to play football at Wimbledon?"

"Ah! Yes, of course! I'm just worried..."

"There is nothing to worry about. I know my body myself. Even if I get hurt, I don't think it will happen. Don't worry."

Chu Zhongtian said this, what else can Alai Russell say?

Of course, he hoped that Chu Zhongtian could play for two years.

"That's all, Alai. My agent will go to find you at that time. Please discuss the specific details. Anyway, this is the main principle."

Alai Russell hung up the phone and was full of excitement. If Chu Zhongtian could join the team, he felt that at least the team's relegation would be fine. An all-around player like Chu Zhongtian could be used by two people on the court. In addition, Chu Zhongtian is the kind of player who can make his teammates perform at a high level, so his joining will definitely improve the strength of Wimbledon's competitive athletics.

He could not wait to tell the club's chairman Eric Samuelson about such good news. So he started dialing the club's chairman's mobile phone, but the other side prompted that the number he was dialing was on the phone.

After dialing a few more times, they were all during the call. Russell could only temporarily suppress the excitement in his heart and would tell the other party the news tomorrow morning.

He is now worried that he will not be able to sleep because he is too excited...※※The reason why Russell called several times but couldn't get through was that Chu Zhongtian was talking to Eric Samuelson.

After deciding to join Wimbledon Athletics, Chu Zhongtian planned to give his future club a meeting gift... Eric Samuelson is the chairman of Wimbledon Athletics Club, the second club chairman in the history of the team. His predecessor was Chris Stewart, who gave an enthusiastic speech at Kings Ranch. At that time, Samuelson was the team's treasurer. After several seasons of chairman, Stewart stepped down from this position. He told Samuelson: "Compared to the club chairman, I prefer to stand in the stands behind the goal to cheer for his team." So he went to cheer, and Samuelson took on the burden of his stay.

This former financial director made great use of economic affairs. Under his rule, Wimbledon Athletics built a new training base and has always been very healthy in finance. Although not rich, he is not in debt.

However, the club chairman is only focused on helping the team avoid bankruptcy and does not do enough to support the team in competitive fields, especially after the team was promoted to the English Championship, he almost gave up his support for competitive fields. For two consecutive summers, the team could only use free transfer players or loans to find new players, and he was very stingy in the transfer market.

Chu Zhongtian thought Wimbledon was going to be promoted to the Premier League. If this was the case, how could he upgrade? The stadium and training ground could be built in the future, but as long as he was promoted to the Premier League, there would be a way to get more investment and sponsorship, and the finances would be better.

So the key is to upgrade. To upgrade, you must add powerful players, and relying on the team's youth training camps and free agents, as well as loan players, is not a solution.

To buy strong aid, you need money. Buying people requires money, but you don’t just pay high prices to attract those stars. Sometimes you can be stingy about transfer fees, but you must not be stingy about players’ salary, because transfer fees are for the club. If the players themselves cannot get it, only the salary is their benefit. In order to get more salary, they will put pressure on their bosses and force the opponent’s club to accept lower quotes. Don’t think that the club that buys people in this way will take advantage of it. There is no such thing as thanking the players for their efforts. In order to thank the players, the club that buys players will provide a contract with good treatment to the player. So what you saved on transfer fees is actually added to the salary in disguise.

In short, if the club doesn't make a penny, the players are the real profiters.

Whether it is the transfer fee or salary, these require money.

With Wimbledon Sports' current financial situation, it is difficult for them to invest more funds in the transfer market and increase the salary standards of the entire team.

But Chu Zhongtian is not short of money... so this is the meeting gift he wants to give to the team.

Eric Samuelson is now having a headache where to find so much money to build a new stadium - for the same problem, his perspective is completely different from that of the head coach. Russell believes that as long as he gives him money and buy more capable players, the team can be promoted to the Premier League. But he thinks that if the stadium does not meet the standards, what if it is promoted to the Premier League? It is not that he will be beaten back to the Championship due to hardware factors.

He advocated building the hardware facilities first and then seeking upgrades. Anyway, it is only one level away from the Premier League now, and the time for upgrading is questionable.

He tried his best to attract sponsorship to the team, but the results were minimal.

The team's main sponsor is Si, a famous British football manager game production company. But Si is not a wealthy game company. His main works are only the "Football Manager (FM)" series. Although FM is a well-deserved overlord in football business strategy games, the market is only so big. Si cannot be compared with game giants such as ea, Blizzard, Konami, Sega, and Sony.

Besides, there are not many sponsorship funds and they have to be brave enough to build hardware. Since the club decided to start the training base construction project, it has completely spent money... Now the training base is about to be built, but the new stadium has been raised on the agenda... Many media think that Samuelson is completely crazy - small teams like Wimbledon Athletic want to build a new stadium, where do they get the funds and strength? Even in their previous life, Wimbledon has been renting the home court of Crystal Palace, Sheikhist Park Stadium, and has never had the idea of ​​building a new stadium.

They don’t know Samuelson’s good intentions. Samuelson was reflecting on why the teams that the fans of his community had always supported would abandon their supporters and go to other places to change their names and start over. Apart from the intervention of external capital, it may be related to the team’s own stadium. When a team has its own stadium, they will feel a sense of belonging here, and they will be closely linked to the land where the stadium is located and the people on the land.

Just like the relationship between Stamford Bridge and Chelsea, and Chelsea fans, as well as the relationship between Old Trafford and Manchester United, Manchester United fans, Anfield and Liverpool and Liverpool fans.

These teams are glorious because of their respective stadiums, and the fans of these teams also regard their stadiums as holy places. But Wimbledon did not, and never. They had a Prau Lane before. Prau Lane was too small to meet the requirements of the Premier League. Since they had no money to build a new stadium and could not be expanded, they had to rent the Crystal Palace stadium for the game. In the long run, the entire team lost their emotional support for their community from the bottom of their hearts. How fanatic was when Wimbledon was still playing in Prau Lane. The relationship between the team and the fans was flawless, but it changed later.

Why?

Isn’t it because there is no stadium of its own?

In order to avoid this happening again, Samuelson decided to make a stadium that belongs entirely to Wimbledon Athletics. In this way, the Wimbledon community can be truly connected with this team and forever. As long as the stadium exists for one day, the relationship between Wimbledon Athletics and Wimbledon will last for one day.

Chu Zhongtian listened to Samuelson's explanation of his eagerness to build the stadium on the other end of the phone. He understood Samuelson's idea a little. However... "If the team does not replenish players now, they will be afraid of being relegated to the First Division, Eric." Chu Zhongtian also expressed his concerns. "I am worried that this will make Wimbledon Athletics hang out in such low-level leagues for a long time due to lack of strength, and even become a lift, constantly upgrading and relegating. This will wreck off the temperament of a team - our current opportunity is quite good, we have a firm goal, which encourages everyone to work hard. If this goal can be achieved, the development of Wimbledon Athletics will enter a new stage. I think this goal must be achieved as soon as possible."

Samuelson shrugged on the other end of the phone: "I'm worried about this too, but I really can't come up with more money..."

Chu Zhongtian smiled and said, "I want to pay a membership fee to the club. Is it OK now?"

Samuelson was a little surprised and was not mentally prepared for the jumpingness of Chu Zhongtian's topic. "Ah? What did you say?"

“I said I plan to pay the membership fee.”

Samuelson was very strange: "Chu, you have paid the membership fee this year..."

Since Wimbledon Athletics announced its professionalization, each of Chu Zhongtian and Emily have a fixed membership fee of £500,000 each year. They have the largest membership fee, and no one has more than them.

It can also be seen from this that if Wimbledon, which has a small number of members, only rely on membership fees, it cannot even guarantee the most basic survival.

When Wimbledon was still in the amateur league, a membership fee of £500,000 could make them live a good life, but in the professional league, the money was not enough.

Chu Zhongtian said: "Yes, I know. But there seems to be no limit on the number of times each member pays dues in the membership charter."

There is indeed no such regulation in Wimbledon Athletics’ membership charter, saying that each member can only pay membership fees once a year - because this is almost no need to be written into the membership charter rules that everyone knows. Does anyone pay membership fees once a month? Membership fees are collected once a year.

But Chu Zhongtian took advantage of this loophole.

Samuelson quickly realized that Chu Zhongtian was in disguise to increase income to the team and solve financial problems. Wimbledon Athletics is a small club, so there are not many members, and there are even fewer famous people among the members, and there are only a handful of rich rich people. Only Chu Zhongtian has this strength... Since Wimbledon Athletics is a member-based club and refuses to accept capital injection from outside capital, Wimbledon Athletics' funding source has always been very limited. In addition to ticket revenue, sponsors and membership fees, it is the sale of players' transfer fees. In today's football world, this is of course a very healthy operation method, but it is not a very competitive operation method.

However, the Wimbledon Athletic Club's constitution restricts the club from accepting external investments. The financial situation of Wimbledon Athletic can be imagined... If you want to help the team, you can only use the excuse of "paying membership fees".

But he was unwilling to let Chu Lai take this part of the pressure every time. You should know that the couple paid a membership fee of 1 million pounds a year, which is the highest among all members.

After all, no matter how rich Chu Zhongtian is, it is Chu Zhongtian's money. Wimbledon Athletics is everyone's Wimbledon Athletics, not Chu Zhongtian alone. There is no reason to ask Chu Zhongtian to pay to help the team. In the long run, this will become a very bad example and will eventually push the club's future to the capital side - whoever has money will have more say in the development of the team. This is why when Wimbledon Athletics was established, no matter how much membership fee each member paid, each person only has one vote. When voting, a ticket in the hands of a rich person cannot be used as ten votes.

"Uh, Chu, you know... We are very grateful for your support for the club, but there is no need for this. Besides, you also know that no matter how much membership you pay, your power will be the same as other members..." Samuelson tactfully reminded Chu Zhongtian, for fear that he would have the idea of ​​"I paid a lot of money so I have more power in this team."

"I know all this. I don't think of turning this team into my own private product. Don't worry, Eric. I just want to fulfill my obligations for the team. I am a member of the team's board of directors, but I have never attended any board meetings. I feel guilty and I may not have time to attend the board of directors in the future. So I want to give the team some compensation in terms of economic terms - isn't this possible?" Chu Zhongtian did not tell the other party about his plan to join the team.

Samuelson was silent.

In fact, he is very conflicted now. On the one hand, he doesn't want Chu to spend so much money. He can't say whoever has money should give more money. No matter how rich he is, it's his own money. Others have no right to ask the other party to contribute more, otherwise it would not be voluntary payment, but forced, the nature changes and the taste changes. On the other hand, Samuelson also knew that if Chu Zhongtian was willing to take action, he could really help the team. Russell had talked to him before, asking the club to support his actions in the transfer market during the early winter break, otherwise he really could not guarantee that the team would continue to stay in the English Championship next season. "I have done my best, but sometimes what you know is not something I can change with all my best..." Russell said so, and it sounds really bad.

Seeing that there was no sound on the other side of the phone, Chu Zhongtian knew that Samuelson must be very conflicted, so he didn't care whether Samuelson agreed or not and said directly: "I plan to pay another 10 million pounds of membership fee."

Samuelson felt his hand shaking with his phone, and his heart almost stopped beating!
Chapter completed!