The God of Football Starts With Passive Skills

Chapter 454 - 95: Frenzied Signings! The Bundesliga’s Salary Ceiling! Football’s Highest Price Tag! The New Season’s Goal: Break Records

For the past few years, Adidas had always held Giant Yao in high regard, maintaining an excellent partnership with him.

In the last two years, however, both Giant Yao and Flying Liu have been plagued by injuries, and their influence and commercial value have started to decline.

And at this very moment, Wang Shuo burst onto the scene in the Bundesliga!

After hearing Beckenbauer’s high praise for Wang Shuo, Herbert Hainer immediately instructed the Football Division to launch a new round of market research on the player, spanning from the Greater China Region to the entire Asian market.

And now, lying before them was a thick stack of research reports.

The report on top detailed how Wang Shuo had just signed three lucrative sponsorship deals in China in quick succession.

But that wasn’t the main point.

What truly surprised the Adidas senior executives was that these three sponsorship deals had been hand-picked from over a dozen other serious offers.

In other words, Wang Shuo’s influence in the Chinese market was far greater than what these deals alone suggested.

"We also had our teams across Asia conduct research. The results show that Wang Shuo is one of the most recognized football players in most Asian countries, including South Korea, Japan, and India."

"His recognition rivals even that of Ronaldo and Messi. Among all athletes, he’s also ranked near the top."

"Based on our preliminary assessment, Wang Shuo’s current commercial value is estimated at 480 million US Dollars, or about 385 million euros, and we believe he is still being severely undervalued!"

Hainer listened to his subordinate’s briefing as he read the report in his hands.

He was stunned when he heard the figure.

Because not even Ronaldo or Messi necessarily commanded such a high commercial value.

"Is that figure accurate?" Hainer asked.

"If anything, it’s an underestimate!"

Hainer was somewhat surprised. "Why?"

"According to our research, thanks to the Bundesliga’s free promotional efforts in Asia over the past two years, Wang Shuo’s influence throughout Southeast Asia and across multiple countries and regions in East Asia is extremely high, even surpassing Messi and Ronaldo."

Others might have been surprised, but Hainer was not.

He knew very well that this was a perfectly normal phenomenon.

The Asian market naturally has a greater affinity for Asian athletes.

"Despite China, Japan, and South Korea being fierce football rivals, Wang Shuo’s influence in Japan and South Korea surpasses that of their own national stars. He’s only slightly behind Ronaldo, Messi, Kaka, and Beckham."

"And in China, Wang Shuo has already surpassed Giant Yao and Flying Liu. He’s the undisputed number one!"

Hainer flipped to another report.

The most important core market in Asia was the Greater China Region.

As of May 31, Adidas’s sales in the Greater China Region were 400 million euros, down 20% year-on-year.

The main causes were excess inventory following the 2008 Olympics, combined with the impact of the subprime mortgage crisis.

Throughout 2009, Adidas had closed two to three hundred stores in the Greater China Region.

More importantly, while Adidas was in decline, its arch-rival Nike’s sales for the same period reached 1.36 billion euros.

More than three times Adidas’s numbers.

As one of the six core markets in Adidas’s global strategy, and also the market with the greatest future growth potential, the Greater China Region’s performance plunged Adidas into an unprecedented crisis.

’How can we revitalize the Greater China Region market?’

Herbert Hainer’s answer was Wang Shuo!

The market research report before him was undoubtedly his most compelling ammunition.

The good news for Adidas was that Wang Shuo was already one of their athletes.

The bad news was that his contract, which began in 2008, was set to expire in 2012.

At the time, they had only signed him for four years at 1.5 million euros per year.

In other words, only two years remained on the deal.

Given the current trend, if Adidas was serious about Wang Shuo, they would need to renew his contract as soon as possible.

Because, according to reliable intelligence obtained by Adidas, Nike was also circling.

With Flying Liu constantly injured and his commercial value plummeting, Nike was also in desperate need of a figure like Wang Shuo to emerge.

"Why did we only sign him for four years?" Herbert Hainer asked, frowning.

There was no fixed rule for contract length. Some were for only two or three years, while for others, no formal contract was signed at all—Adidas would simply provide some football boots and athletic gear.

For athletes with higher commercial value, however, long-term contracts were the norm.

But the longer the contract, the higher the price.

"Wang Shuo’s agent at the time was Thomas Essien. During negotiations, we had some disagreements over the contract’s value, so we ultimately opted to shorten the term."

Hainer rubbed his forehead, exasperated.

"What’s the situation now?" Hainer asked, his expression grave.

"We’ve made initial contact, but negotiations have stalled. Wang Shuo just hired a new agent—a young, but very troublesome, beautiful Chinese woman."

"How much are they asking for?"

"We don’t know. That’s the trickiest part."

The most daunting part of any negotiation is not knowing what the other side wants.

"But according to our intel, they’ve been in contact with people from Nike."

Such contact was, of course, presumably conducted in a way that didn’t violate his current contract.

"Our current internal consensus is to elevate Wang Shuo to top-tier athlete status for the new season and launch the first generation of his own signature boots, custom-designed for him."

A custom signature line—this was the highest tier of athlete endorsement.

It would include not just boots, but a whole series of accompanying products like apparel and accessories, which would be updated with new versions regularly.