The news was so explosive it couldn't be described as just "hot." As soon as the official announcement was made, comments flooded in like a tide, instantly exceeding ten thousand. After just one hour, the number of comments surpassed nine hundred thousand!
It was even now hurtling towards the million mark, on the verge of reaching it!
Cao Baiming sat on the long corridor beside his courtyard. Under the yellow light, he opened his phone and browsed the fans' comments below the news, a slight smile involuntarily curving his lips.
These fans were truly adorable. Their words, while expressing surprise, were also full of affection. They had been stimulated by such news quite a bit recently.
"The Premier League has completely changed, and the football landscape will be irrevocably altered!!!"
"Arsenal actually kicked out both Cao Baiming and Messi in one go. What were they thinking? Such a scumbag move!"
"Cao Baiming has the skill. He's not like some star players who are all hype and have mediocre footwork. With Cao Baiming's ability, he should shine wherever he goes, right?"
"But that doesn't mean Nottingham Forest will directly win the Premier League, does it? That would be too outrageous!"
"Unless Messi also goes to Nottingham Forest, Cao Baiming alone probably isn't enough to carry the other ten players. Football is a team sport. One person carrying a whole team? That's unbelievable!"
At this very moment, the players from the Tangguo National Club found these comments laughable.
"These people are truly naive. Isn't it already obvious that Cao Baiming can carry a team alone? They have absolutely no memory, alas!"
Cao Baiming, of course, couldn't read all these nearly one million comments one by one. He only saw the most prominent ones, including those with the highest likes and the most recent posts.
However, he soon discovered the second thing fans were frantically discussing: money!
Many people, after just a cursory glance at the news, felt genuine shock and rushed to the comment section to express their feelings.
But there was also a portion of more attentive fans who noticed a less conspicuous detail in the news: Cao Baiming's signing bonus!
To make it less obvious, Nottingham Forest's official team directly allocated fifty thousand of the hundred thousand yuan Cao Baiming had mentioned as the signing fee for successfully joining the club. The remaining fifty thousand would be Cao Baiming's total salary for the next year and a half!
This money was settled in full on the spot, and Cao Baiming immediately gave it to Mike as a tip.
The news mentioned the five-thousand-dollar signing fee, though it didn't detail Cao Baiming's salary for the upcoming period.
Consider this: even a trash player ranked at the bottom of a Championship league would have a minimum signing fee of one hundred thousand. This was the Premier League!
For a top superstar like Cao Baiming, a signing fee of only fifty thousand? Wasn't that absurd?
Soon, fans began to furiously debate. Many who hadn't noticed this easily overlooked detail while browsing the news began to discover it by reading the comments.
More and more people joined the discussion, but everyone could only speculate wildly, guessing why Cao Baiming's signing fee was only fifty thousand.
Earlier, they had thought that Cao Baiming's transfer might even set a new all-time record for signing fees. Many had already anticipated this satisfying scenario.
But reality was completely different from their expectations. Not only did they not break any records, but it was so meager, as if he were being given alms!
Many fans even mentioned that Cao Baiming's personal signing fee when he joined Arsenal had reached three million. At that time, he was still a relatively unknown Tangguo football kid whose talent hadn't yet been fully showcased.
In recent major player transfers, signing fees of tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of euros were commonplace. In comparison, this fifty-thousand-euro signing fee felt remarkably different, like a single red flower amidst a thousand green ones.
"Cao Baiming! As expected, he's just as unpredictable!"
Fans gradually realized that no reason seemed to hold up. At this moment, they could only wait for Cao Baiming to personally reveal the answer at the press conference.
Upon reflection, it wasn't difficult to infer one possible reason: Nottingham Forest, an unknown team in the Premier League, might not have the funds for such a high fee.
And Cao Baiming happened to be a straightforward person. After all, as someone whose assets already exceeded a hundred billion, why would he care about tens of millions in transfer fees?
However, what the fans didn't know was that the signing fee was merely a superficial figure. The truly significant matter was his salary for the next year and a half. Cao Baiming only asked for fifty thousand yuan, a fact known only to Nottingham Forest. They had no intention of publicizing it.
There was no need for so many people to know about this. After all, the club didn't want to be cursed by fans. As the saying goes, "A family's shame should not be aired publicly." Although Cao Baiming proposed it himself, it was ultimately because he was short on money!
He was too embarrassed to say it directly. If his own fans heard, they might understand the situation. But if Cao Baiming's fans found out, the scolding would come pouring in, and that was something ordinary people couldn't withstand – on a scale of hundreds of millions!
Cao Baiming's current salary was essentially less than that of an ordinary worker, perhaps even comparable to a street beggar.
An experienced beggar, knowing where and how to elicit more sympathy and earn more alms, might not even earn fifty thousand yuan in a year and a half!
Cao Baiming, a top football superstar, the world's number one at present, a Ballon d'Or candidate, and a future star, had fallen to a level worse than a beggar. How would his fans react if they heard this?
Cao Baiming continued browsing the news. After a few minutes, he lost interest.