Man City set for £4m-£8m windfall as Real Madrid's £130m bid for Alvarez is rejected

Manchester City stand to earn between £4m and £8m if Julian Alvarez leaves Atletico Madrid this summer, after a sell-on clause inserted into his 2024 departure continues to pay dividends for the club.

Real Madrid confirmed they had submitted a €150m (£130m) offer for the Argentine striker, only for Atletico to reject it outright, pointing to the player’s €500m release clause as the benchmark for any deal. Los Blancos made Alvarez a priority target following the re-election of president Florentino Perez, but their city rivals showed no willingness to negotiate below that figure.

City sold Alvarez to Atletico in 2024 for an initial £64.4m, with add-ons taking the total package to £81.5m. Embedded in that agreement was a 10 per cent sell-on clause on any future profit. The precise windfall is difficult to calculate given the complexity of the bonus structure and which clauses have been triggered, but sources indicate City would pocket somewhere in the £4m-£8m range if Alvarez moves for €150m.

The 26-year-old won the Treble in his debut season at the Etihad and collected six major honours across two years in Manchester before becoming the club’s record sale. He left primarily because Erling Haaland’s presence made regular starts as a central striker difficult to come by.

Alvarez is currently representing Argentina at the World Cup, meaning any transfer activity is likely to intensify once the tournament concludes.

The sell-on mechanism is a routine feature of City’s transfer strategy. The club regularly insert sell-on and matching-rights clauses into outgoing deals — including for younger players — allowing them to benefit financially or retain a right of return if a former player’s value rises significantly, as they exercised with goalkeeper James Trafford last summer.

Whether Real Madrid return with a revised offer or pursue alternative targets remains to be seen, but Atletico’s firm stance and the scale of the release clause suggest any resolution will require a significant shift in one party’s position.