by Ian Royal »
11 Mar 2012 22:52
Not really the same thing at all.
Add ons are fixed additional payments for appearances, goals, promotions, caps etc. They are set in the original transfer and a known monetary amount. A sell on clause is usually a percentage of the profit when the player is sold to another club. It's not quantifiable because there is no way of knowing if that player will ever be sold by club X, if it'll be for a profit and if so how much profit.
Therefore you can certainly have a transfer of £7m all upfront with a 15% sell on clause for example. Just because we may get more money when he's sold doesn't mean the transfer fee when we sold him wasn't all up front.
Should the sell on fee angle be correct, and should the all up front be correct. We'll be receiving money in addition to the £7m transfer fee he went for. Assuming that figure was accurately reported in the first place of course.