Team Spain performs during the finalsduring the Singapore 2025 World Aquatics Championships at World Aquatics Championships Arena on July 20, 2025 in Singapore. (Photo by Hollie Adams/Reuters)

Iraqi children play with a ball on a street blocked with burning tyres, amid a general strike in the southern city of Basra, on November 25, 2019. The demonstrations rocking the capital and Shiite-majority south since October 1 are the biggest grassroots movement the country has seen in decades. Sparked by outrage over rampant government corruption, poor services and lack of jobs, they have since gone straight to the source: calling out the ruling system as inherently flawed and in need of a total overhaul. (Photo by Hussein Faleh/AFP Photo)

A woman and child look on at volcanic ash rising into the air during the eruption of Mount Ibu, as seen from Duono Village in West Halmahera, North Maluku province, on January 15, 2025. (Photo by AZZAM via AFP Photo)

This photograph shows installing of the artwork of Venezuelan-US artist Alex Da Corte titled “Kermit the Frog, Even” at Place Vendome in Paris, on October 19, 2025, ahead of the official opening of the Art Basel contemporary and modern art market. (Photo by Dimitar Photo)

An Iraqi woman, dressed as Santa Claus, rides her bicycle amid the spread of the coronavirus in the old city of Mosul, Iraq, December 18, 2020. (Photo by Abdullah Rashid/Reuters)

Pedestrians using umbrellas struggle against rain and strong wind in Tokyo, Japan, 16 August 2024, as typhoon Ampil is approaching. The typhoon is approaching to Kanto Tokyo area and Japan's Meteorological Agency has issued heavy rain warning. The powerful typhoon forces to suspend JR Tokaido Shinkansen bullet train service operated by JR Central Japan Company all day between Tokyo and Nagoya, central Japan, and cancel over 600 flights. (Photo by Kimimasa Mayama/EPA/EFE)

A 71-day-old male Kalimantan orangutan, a critically endangered species, born in the zoo but neglected by its 9-year-old mother Shakila, is held by an animal care taker at Bandung Zoological Gardens in Bandung, West Java on February 21, 2025. (Photo by Timur Matahari/AFP Photo)

Football transfers are not cheap. To have a player strengthen their ranks, teams are willing to pay big money. The football transfer considered to be the most expensive in the sport's history was that of Gareth Bale leaving Tottenham to play at Real Madrid. The Spanish club paid not less than £86 million (about $133 million at today's exchange rates) to have the player among its own. But recent news suggest that this record might be broken this year. According to reports in the media, UK Premier League team Manchester United is willing to almost double that amount.