Real Madrid scraps $1bn UAE football resort in Ras Al Khaimah

Real Madrid has cancelled a planned football-themed resort in the emirate of Ras Al Khaimah after the project’s organiser defaulted on payments, the Spanish club said.

Real Madrid has cancelled a planned football-themed resort in the Emirate of Ras Al Khaimah after the project's organiser defaulted on payments, the club said.

The licensing accord with RAK Marjan Island Football, the Luxembourg-based organiser of the project, was scrapped after it defaulted on payments and “didn’t provide guarantees,” Real said in its financial report distributed in Madrid on Sunday.

Louis-Armand de Rouge, the chief executive of RAK Marjan Island Football, didn’t return calls made by Bloomberg News.

The world’s richest football club said last year it was lending its name to a resort that includes a 10,000-seat stadium, a marina, homes, a shopping mall, a football training academy and a 450-room five-star hotel. The development was set to be completed by 2015 on the 40-hectare artificial Marjan Island. RAK Marjan Island Football assumed all the financial risks of the project, Real Madrid said in its report. The football club, which agreed to a 22-year licence, said it will search for alternative projects in the UAE, without giving more details.

Real Madrid posted a net income of €36.9 million (Dh183.3m) for the year through June 2013. That’s 52 per cent more than the year earlier period after prize money from competitions and exhibition games climbed, according to the annual report.