Okay....so, one of my friends is from Madrid and grew up next door to Alvaro Negredo. Both families are still friends and still live in the same barrio, as he puts it. I asked him about a week ago if he could go and do some digging on our behalf, so here are the results of that. I put it up on the other forum we both go on first, now bringing it here. Enjoy !
Who : El Pichichi
Where : Total Tottenham
When : 27/01/13
so.. I made some phone calls.. Three, to be precise.
First, i spoke to a connection of mine who's a correspondent for newspaper Marca in Lisbon. He told me that, from what he had heard (and he is not completely "inside" the story, because he's in Portugal), Chelsea were pretty interested in taking Negredo, a few weeks ago. However, they turned to Saudi Sportswashing Machine's Ba, because he was cheaper and Premier League proven. What stuck in my mind, however, was that he told me that, apparently, Abramovich was still making a good use of the "Target Shortlist" that was created and given to him by Villas-Boas when he was there trying to reform the club... Apparently, Negredo, Hazard, Oscar or Mata were all part of the list... Benítez preferred Ba to Negredo, though. So, this bit of info actually links Villas-Boas to Negredo...
Then, i contacted a cousin of mine who lives in Sevilla and is a a big Nervionense (Sevilla FC fan). He completely confirmed me that the club is near bankruptcy and that selling some of their jewels seems the only way to really survive some of the Del Nido late policies... He also told me that Sevilla were very actively trying to buy Morata from Real Madrid, to succeed a very probable Negredo exit... As Real Madrid were not very eager to let Morata go, Sevilla were trying to push Diego Lopez as a bonus in the deal (not very relevant, but may be an indication of the clear intention to replace Negredo...). However, my cousin told me that Del Nido is also looking at other possibilities to lift the club's finances and is trying to sell some of the club's shares to an Arab consortium, which would stop the selling of important players, obviously..
I decided against trying to contact Álvaro's father, because i didn't want to burden him (i figure he must have his phone ringing all day long, with questions like this one..) But i did contact some very close friend of Álvaro, who is also a good friend of mine (i'm a bit older than them, but we grew together in the barrio). He told me that Álvaro was really in a very delicate situation, because Del Nido was fully aware of some proposals made for him, but even though he was trying to sell him in order to balance the books, he was still trying to push the value to its maximum, and was driving a hard bargain. Álvaro's position is of course the one of a very professional footballer, but when you know that your boss wants to sell you, that there are more than one club wanting to buy you, and that things still don't get done....it's hard. He is doing his best to play his football and forget everything around him, but there's a lot of things happening every day. From what this friend told me, the clubs that have made bids for Álvaro are Tottenham and Borussia Dortmund. However, Arsenal and Saudi Sportswashing Machine have supposedly made inquiries. Apparently, Del Nido feels that Borussia's offer is better than Tottenham's... But it is the overall opinion that negotiations will happen until the very last day of the window..
So, this was what i could gather. More than what i thought i would.. Even so, of course, it is not very relevant information. But i'll keep my ears open
