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Zurich - FIFA president Sepp Blatter said on Tuesday he was powerless to stop transfer fees from rocketing following the world record fee of €100 million paid by Real Madrid for Welsh winger Gareth Bale.
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"(Even) when you say a country is poor or in debt, you always find money in football," Blatter told reporters.
"If the price of a player is high or not high, I think it's the market that decides and we cannot intervene in the market."
Blatter said he doubted that any player was worth the sum paid for Bale.
"If a player is the value of that, I doubt it, but I cannot stop it," he said.
Blatter said he remembered a similar controversy when Brazilian forward Ronaldo moved from Inter Milan to Real Madrid in 2002.
"At the same time, there was an auction at Sothebys in London where they sold a Picasso painting from the blue period for more than more than £50 million pounds," said Blatter.
"So I said, the man who acquired this painting, he will put it somewhere closed circuit because it's dangerous to lose it.
"But Ronaldo, you will see him twice every week in a stadium."
