Florentino Pérez told Spanish television on Thursday night that, if Real Madrid members vote him back in as president this weekend, he will submit a bid of at least €150m on Tuesday for a player recruited from a big Champions League club.
The promise was specific on timing and price: Pérez said he would make the offer next Tuesday and that it would be “at least €150m,” a figure that would clear Real Madrid’s current transfer record of €127m, set two years ago for Jude Bellingham. Pérez also said the player is not at a Premier League club and is not Erling Haaland.
Pérez made the comments during a campaign appearance on the investigative TV show Horizonte, using the moment to underline his stewardship of the club: he reminded voters that when he took over in 2000 Real Madrid was effectively broke, pointed to seven Champions League trophies won during his two terms, and cited a recent Forbes valuation putting the club at roughly €10 billion.
The election itself is rare — the first Bernabeu vote since 2006 — and involves about 100,000 socios. That is the immediate stake in Pérez’s pledge: the promised offer is conditional on this weekend’s ballot, which will determine whether he returns to the presidential office and can follow through on a headline-grabbing transfer within days.
The campaign has produced blunt claims from both sides. On Wednesday evening Enrique Riquelme told supporters that Erling Haaland and Rodri would both be at the Bernabeu next season if he won. Pérez, answering that line on Horizonte, called the Haaland story a bluff, pointing out that the player’s father, agent and club had denied it, and said his own candidacy exists to shield the club from destabilising theatrics.
That friction — a rival promising marquee recruits and Pérez firing back with a Tuesday deadline for his own blockbuster — leaves a clear practical question: who is the mystery target? Public speculation has named figures ranging from Michael Olise to other high-profile European players; an earlier FilmoGaz piece outlines Olise among reported possibilities ( Pérez himself would only say the target is a “total galáctico,” that Madrid must first talk to the selling club and that the deal would be the biggest in the club’s history.
What matters next is straightforward and immediate. Real Madrid’s members vote this weekend; if they return Pérez to the presidency he has promised to make his move on Tuesday to a big Champions League club. The most consequential unanswered item is not the price — Pérez has set that floor — but the identity and location of the player he insists is not in the Premier League and is ready to become Madrid’s new record signing.
