Edinson Cavani thought he would be an Atlético Madrid player right now.
The Uruguayan did everything he could to facilitate a transfer as he was in search of more playing time and believed he would thrive under Atléti manager Diego Simeone. Unfortunately, the La Liga side would not meet Paris Saint-Germain’s asking price of €20 million.
Last Saturday, after Atlético Madrid lost 1-0 to rivals Real Madrid, their club president, Enrique Cerezo, stated that he doesn’t believe Cavani did everything possible to get the deal over the line as reported by Marca.
“I find it a shame, the situations some players find themselves in with family and representatives,” Cerezo said. “We will not be robbed!”
The implication here is that it was Cavani’s agent and half-brother, Wálter Guglielmone, held up negotiations because he wanted some kind of personal bonus for working on the deal.
After Cerezo’s comments, Guglielmone fired back.
“Do you think he [Cavani] went one month without playing so that I could capsize the whole thing over a commission and stop his dream from coming to fruition?”
“What about all the fuss we made with PSG? If it was a question of money, Edi would have gone to England—Chelsea or Manchester. Atlético could not support the economic cost of the operation and PSG would not budge from their demands. Neither party could reach an agreement.”
Now, another member of Cavani’s family is chiming in about El Matador‘s failed transfer to Atlético Madrid.
During the January transfer window, Berta Gomez, Cavani’s mother, accused PSG of not doing the right thing with her son considering all that he’s done for the club.
Today, Le Parisien reports that Gomez is not happy with Cerezo and doesn’t understand why he would blame Guglielmone for the failed transfer.
“We do not understand why the president said such barbarity,” Gomez said. “It was irrelevant. It hurt a lot because it is absolutely untrue that Wálter asked for a signing bonus.”
Gomez went on to say that PSG’s all-time leading scorer “did everything he could to go to Atlético. He put pressure on PSG to let him go and then he told his brother that he was willing to lower his salary to facilitate a transfer. He wanted to play for Simeone and he demonstrated it every moment. Edinson didn’t want money to be a problem, because if it was for the money, he would have gone to Manchester United, Chelsea, or Inter Miami, who made an important offer for him.”
It’s thought that Los Rojiblancos could return this summer when Cavani’s contract with PSG expires and sign him on a free, but, Gomez indicates that “he [Cerezo] must ask for forgiveness.”
Cavani will have plenty of offers for his services this summer and it will be interesting to see how Atlético plans to make things right after their president’s unfair comments about Cavani’s agent.
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