Zidane is a £45m bargain

Real Madrid's decision to smash the world-record transfer fee for the second summer in succession is not as crazy as it seems. By paying Juventus around £45m for Zinedine Zidane, not only have they upped the ante once more, surpassing the £37m they paid Barcelona for Luis Figo last year, but the Spanish champions have shown that they are prepared to pay what it takes to attract the very best players to the Bernabeu.

While £45m is a breathtaking sum for one player, it's not bad in the current market. Just look at what's been spent by pretenders to Real's throne as Europe's number one club - Manchester United are on the verging of giving Lazio £23m for Juan Veron; Parma will benefit from Zidane's departure by accepting an astonishing £32m of the ZZ fee for goalkeeper, Gianluigi Buffon; while Lazio paid a combined £60m for Claudio Lopez (Valencia) and Hernan Crespo (Parma) last summer.

So what have Real actually done? Well, they've paid less than 50% more for arguably the world's greatest player than Juve have to get Italy's second-best keeper!

Considering that the Spanish football market is booming - there's a £460m budget swilling around the Primera Liga, four times what was spent ten years ago - Real have merely speculated to accumulate, as they did with Figo. President Florentino Perez has said that by buying the best players in the world - and we're not talking second-tier stars like Ruud van Nistelrooy or Sol Campbell here - he was confident that the trophies would continue to pour into the club, followed by rivers of sponsorship and TV cash.

He was right. Real won the Spanish League by a country mile last season and reached the semi-finals of the European Cup/Champions League. And they'll be the team to beat in Europe's premier competition again this season.

And by owning 90% of his image rights, Real plan to cover Zidane's £3.7m salary with income from endorsement deals alone! They also expect to sell half a million Zidane shirts, just as they did Figo's last season, raking in £11m. So that leaves £31m outstanding before they break even on the deal. Real have borrowed that in advance of a new pay-per-view TV deal which will bring enormous revenue.

So if it's a financially sound deal, what about footballing-wise?

You can't argue with that either. Zidane is unquestionably one of the best two or three players in the world. Watch him play for Juventus and it's hard to think of a single player who regularly has such an influence on a match as the French midfielder. Just as Diego Maradona was the fulcrum of everything Napoli did (winning Serie A twice for a start) and Pele the cutting edge of Brazil, Zidane WAS Juventus.

Almost every attacking move goes through him. He is their axis. And while Patrick Vieira does the same job for Arsenal, he has nothing like the creative impact of his France team-mate. Zidane can destroy defences with his passing over any distance, his dribbling is so unpredictable as to be unstoppable, his control is exquisite and his tricks are matched only by Rivaldo. Oh, and he scores free-kicks like David Beckham. This is an all-time great.

The one accusation levelled at him is that he can freeze on the biggest stage. True, his displays in cup finals for France and Juventus have sometimes been quiet by his standards, but if the opposition do snuff him out, they tend to put so much effort into it that his team-mates exploit the space they leave. And what can't be denied is that the boy from Marseille gets teams to cup finals by destroying quality opposition almost single-handedly.

Where he will fit into a Real midfield which is already one of the best in the world remains to be seen. With Figo roaming down the right flank, Ivan Helguera or Claude Makelele anchoring the centre and Guti wanting to play ahead of them, that doesn't leave much space for the magical Zidane.

Unfortunately for Steve McManaman, Zidane would fit perfectly into the left of centre role the England man fills so superbly. Leaving room for Roberto Carlos to career down the left flank, Macca tucks in and passes the ball beautifully, letting others do the fancy stuff. And if Real go ahead and buy Gaizka Mendieta from Valencia, as they want to, that will almost certainly see Macca axed from the first 11.

The scouser claims there is no such thing, but he knows full well that there is. In the biggest games, even when everyone was fit, Macca has been in the team. Next season, with Zidane and Mendieta, Figo, Helguera and Makelele, he probably won't be. Then there's Guti, Munitis, Celades, Solari and Rivera to worry about.

Macca will get plenty of action - there are 38 Primera Liga games, at least a dozen Champions League group games and a handful of Spanish Cup ties to share out - but he might have to sit out more games than he would like.

Oh well, at least he can sit back and watch one the most glorious footballing talents of all time at work.