Now before we enter the article, we must approach this as a discourse. A conversation, if you will. Take what you read as a pool of questions, rather than a swamp of answers. It’s all food for thought.

For anyone with a beating heart, and sound mind, the cost of human life is immeasurable. Not least the life of Emiliano Sala. As humans, we are nature. Part of a broad and evolutionary ecosystem in which, if stripped back to its purest, would still survive.

The entity of money is a man-made transaction of tokens in which we deem worth x or y; i watched 3 hours’ worth of Friedrich Durrenmatt’s stylised play “The Visit” learning this so bear with me. But despite being an entity, business does very much exist in a much more brooding, physical form and football is a business. There is £15million sat helplessly in limbo between Nantes and Cardiff City, so how exactly should we deal with this?

Well first, let’s access the facts. On Tuesday, a legal letter was received by Cardiff from Nantes. The document was the second demand in the space of a week of the first instalment of Emiliano Sala’s £15million transfer fee. The telegraph reads:

“The Welsh club are understood to be taken aback by the timings of the correspondence as underwater rescue teams are still in the process of retrieving the plane where Sala is believed to have died.”

Further to this, Nantes are threatening to take legal action within 10 days of the legal letter. This made my stomach drop. It seemed too intense. It seemed too quick. It seemed poorly timed.

But let’s try and understand why. Let’s think of what actually needs paying for. William and Mark Mckay were the intermediaries who worked the transfer through the motions. Now, they were not on that plane, but the work they did in the transfer still requires a cut.

There are international fees, tax fees, the fuel needed paying for the plane, the hire of the plane, perhaps a Cardiff-based business were lined up to sponsor Sala and have now lost out on a massive opportunity. His mother was due to receive £1million from the transfer. There is so much more about this than the initial transaction. There are 100’s more lives affected by this – should all those businesses be affected by the disaster?

Now it’s important to look at how the £15million effects the clubs. To bolster their team for their Premier League season, Cardiff spent £27million – £10million on Bobby Reid and Josh Murphy each included. In that summer, Cardiff were rumoured to pay up to £20million on a striker with no other significant rumours, that screams to me that funds aren’t there to be played with – thus £15million is a BIG chunk of money to Cardiff. In addition to this, Sala was an investment in a resource that could keep Cardiff in the Premier League to continue to reap the riches – this is now at risk.

Nantes, on the other hand, have no Premier League lucrative deal. Their previous big signings rely on loans and free agents – £15million is life changing. The 3 instalments over 3 years would keep the club on its feet and move them forward, but Cardiff simply aren’t getting anything for their money, are they?

Although nothing has been confirmed as of yet, it still remains a possibility. Cardiff City have a £15million insurance policy on all their players, maybe, just maybe Sala was added to this before he went missing, and Cardiff could get a pay-out. We will see as the story unfolds.

It’s all food for thought.