Florentino Perez was obsessed with bringing Kylian Mbappe to the Santiago Bernabeu for years, no matter how expensive the price, how difficult it was to deal with PSG, or even the rejection from Mbappe himself in 2022 when he could have left for Real Madrid then and there after Los Blancos won their 14th ever Champions League title.
Mbappe finally made his way to the Bernabeu in 2024 after yet another Real Madrid Champions League triumph, but even though he had already spurned Real one before, he got a megadeal. Real Madrid agreed to pay Mbappe more than 30 million euros per season in wages, but that was only the sweetener. Florentino even paid him a 150 million euro signing bonus spread over the five year duration of his contract, in lieu of having to pay PSG any transfer fee. As if that were not it, Real Madrid also granted Mbappe 80 percent of his image rights.
All of these details matter now that Vinicius Junior has less than a year left on his contract and is in frantic negotiations over a new deal. Real Madrid cannot afford to lose the best left winger in the world for free, and Arsenal are hot on his heels, with Mikel Arteta and Andrea Berta identifying the Brazilian as their No. 1 dream target to finally get the club over the Champions League hump after they won the Premier League at long last once more in 2026.
Image rights are a huge deal at Real Madrid
Vinicius Jr. wants to stay with Real Madrid, but he also wants a deal closer to the special free agent package that Kylian Mbappe got in 2024, even though VIni is decisively not a free agent. And there is a lot about the Galactic Mbappe deal that Florentino Perez is now paying for because Vinicius, playing a similar position, wants to be treated similarly to the French superstar.
There is one sticking point worth keeping in mind as the two sides hash over the salary and even the request from Vinicius Jr. for the bonus. The image rights. Those were a huge bargaining topic that required compromise even when Mbappe joined, and he was able to get an even better deal than Cristiano Ronaldo, who had won the treble and the Ballon d'Or before arriving to Real Madrid that went years without the Champions League, got despite Ronaldo being a bigger profile at a time when Real were more desperate to win.
See, Florentino was very strict on the image rights with Cristiano and has always been in every case except for Mbappe's. Ronaldo got a generous deal out of Florentino for that time, but even he could go no higher than a 60/40 split on image rights to break up Real Madrid's strict 50/50 policy.
Mbappe is at 80/20, which is insane to think about, because Vinicius Jr., like almost everyone else, still only splits 50/50. And now, he wants a bigger share of the pie, which is very valuable since superstars, especially in this day and age, generate even more money off their own image in today's social media - and highly individualistic, stan culture - world. Florentino giving in to Mbappe's 80 percent demand, which he would not even dare give to the GOAT Cristiano Ronaldo, is coming back to bite him and could be one of the details that helps lead to Vinicius Jr. heading to North London where his image will be even more sellable.
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