Piqué and Rubiales land a good deal with a bad partner

Luis Rubiales appeared before the press yesterday. He turned up late and justified the delay by the time he had needed to get Saudi Arabia to allow him to violate the confidentiality clauses of the contract. I was less happy about that. Misuse has turned the word confidentiality into something tolerated, almost honourable, when in reality it means concealment, the antithesis of transparency. A refuge for concealing deceit or hiding shady dealings. It’s not a football thing, of course, no more than the commission to agents and their huge profits.

He was hurt and sincere. He, I have no doubt, wanted to modify the Spanish Super Cup to make it a better tournament and he achieved that, with more money for the clubs and more for the Spanish FA, which gives him more personal income, but there are consequences for that. He has also improved the Spanish Super Cup, he has replaced Segunda B with something better, has appointed the right coach, and Spanish football is better for it. But someone has hacked his phone and that has led El Confidencial to reveal how this new Super Cup was created, halfway between the grotesque and the scandalous.

Piqué and Kosmos land deal with Saudi Arabia

The problem is that Rubiales has done this with a bad partner. Of course, he didn’t choose that, it was Gerard Piqué who found it and who came up with the idea. And it was more than just a contact with Saudi Arabia, as Rubiales claimed yesterday. He participated in the strategy and organised a deal that led to Kosmos, Piqué's company, being paid more than two of the clubs participating in the Super Cup. It was suspected, it was even published, but it remained a rumour. Now we’ve seen the full account of it, and both men are genuinely surprised that this is a scandal in society. That’s largely down to the fact that those who go to these heights don’t feel conditioned by the ethical concerns of the ordinary citizen.