Real Madrid President, Florentino Perez was reported to have had an ambitious plan of moving Real Madrid away from the Santiago Bernabeu stadium to a new ground located in a theme park.
The plans of the proposed stadium identified as RealMadridLand were set into action by the Real’s chief in the 2017-18 season with billionaire businessman, Perez, meeting with Disney directors over his ambitious plans.
Real Madrid has played at the Santiago Bernabeu iconic ground since 1947 but president Florentino Perez, who is also a civil engineer billionaire, was desperate about moving into new territory.
Having initially discussed such plans back in 2004 in a board meeting, fast forward to the 2017/18 season, Perez has been pushing hard to make the plans happen.
It’s believed that Perez envisioned a ‘RealMadridland’; a headquarters that would include Real Madrid’s theme park, an adequate training complex that will accommodate all teams, and a new stadium.
Perez is increasingly concerned about Real Madrid’s capacity to keep up with state-owned clubs like Paris Saint Germain and Manchester City, to boost revenue streams that could maintain Los blancos’ global dominance.
This innovative idea came after Perez drew sketches of rollercoasters related to iconic moments in Real Madrid’s history, including Zinedine Zidane’s sublime volley in the 2002 Champions League final against Bayer Leverkusen at Hampden Park.
Perez’s blueprint and his plans to set Los Blancos on a new route were foreseen in the book ‘Messi vs Ronaldo: One Rivalry, Two GOATs, and the Era That Remade the World’s Game’, when Perez was quoted to have said: “In our world, we are as big as Disney.”
“Real Madrid must do things like this because we are the number-one club, and the only way we will remain there is by always being the first big innovator.”
It’s revealed that Disney’s former CEO Michael Eisner had met with Perez over the plans with the Real Madrid President, keen to discuss the projects with experts in the field.
Even though the outcome of the Disney meetings with Perez appeared to suggest that it was a project Eisner and other experts felt could be done successfully, the plans collapsed as a result of a shortage of money.
Disney’s speculations revealed that Perez would need €2.5 billion of funding and a site close to 250 acres to achieve the new site.
Meanwhile, the amount the Real Madrid billionaire chief had for funding was €1.4 billion, with the land just 140 acres, and there was another issue of Madrid, Spain’s Capital, already in possession of a Warner theme park in the city.
Eventually, the project has been put on hold, and Perez’s failure to build RealMadridLand, and the club missing out on a new revenue stream to keep up with PSG and Manchester City, meant that the chief would have to turn his interest to renovating Santiago Bernabeu.
Moreover, Perez would have to focus on seeing his club continue their glamorous form and win more trophies this season instead of making the team play in a Disney Land kind of atmosphere.
