but this does not even begin to include the thousands of non-playing fans who buy the jerseys and watch the matches every week.

Hoping to tap into this market, Irish company Simple Overseas Properties has announced the launch of the Village at Valle Romano Golf and Resort. The development has been officially endorsed by a number of the biggest UK football clubs, including Aston Villa, Bolton Wanderers, Celtic, Rangers, Leeds United, Newcastle United, West Ham United and Sunderland.

"There are a lot of big clubs taking part in the Village, " says Sunderland manager Roy Keane, "it's great that Sunderland is up there among them, the Costa del Sol offers a fantastic option for warm-weather training for the team in the future."

The involvement of the clubs, which have all carried out their own individual due diligence on the resort and the developers, is an extremely strong purchase motivator, with many buyers wanting to become involved in a project which was closely tied in with their team.

The development's backers previously piloted the concept with Arsenal, where a smaller development sold 70% of the apartments after just nine months.

"By endorsing this project, these football clubs are giving their seal of approval to the quality of the development, which in turn gives peace of mind to their fans, many of whom will become purchasers, " says commentator Jeff Stelling, who also endorses the Village. "The clubs will also be using the Village as their official 'warm weather' training headquarters, meaning there is every chance purchasers could end up owning an apartment next door to their heroes."

As well as Stelling and the clubs, other well known sporting names involved include Seve Ballesteros, who has bought a block of 25, and England goalkeeper Paul Robinson, who has also bought and will lend his name to the onsite football academy.

The Village is located in the Costa Del Sol, one mile from the centre of Estepona, and will consist of 1,100 fullyfurnished one- and two-bed luxury apartments and penthouses, with prices starting from Euro215,000.

Facilities also included are a five-star hotel, 36 holes of PGA standard championship quality golf, two spas, a sports centre, dining facilities and three swimming pools. A deposit of 20% is required to secure a property, with the remaining monies due on final completion, which is anticipated to be in 2009.

Mortgages of up to 80% are also available.

"A rental package will be put into place shortly, which will give the investor a significant return if he chooses to rent out his apartment, the minimum return will be 3% net but we are expecting higher, " says Karl Morris, managing director of Simple Overseas Properties. The Village's planning classification is also under a tourist regime known as 'Apartmentos turisticos', which means the 7% IVA (the Spanish equivalent of VAT) is fully refundable.

The Village will be launched at the Radisson SAS Hotel, Stillorgan on Thursday, 15 February at 6.30pm, and at the Kingsley Hotel, Victoria Cross, Cork on Saturday, 17 and Sunday, 18 February.

For further information contact Simple Overseas Properties: 1850 200 711;

www. simpleoverseas. com.