Over the last days the transfer of Zenit Saint Petersburg forward and Russian international Andrei Arshavin (27) has become increasingly complicated due to the fee demands of his team. Barcelona seems to have left the race at this point.
On Sunday, Zenit published a statement on its official website saying that Barcelona was the only club that has made an offer: "FC Zenit officially informs, that, as of this moment, there are no negotiations about Andrey Arshavin's transfer to any club. The only request about possibility of forward's transfer was the offer from Spanish Barcelona FC. Information in mass media about Zenit's negotiations with Chelsea FC is not corresponding to the truth. "
One day later, a new statement - that was only published on the Russian version of the site of the Russian club - said that Barcelona was not willing to improve its initial bid of 15 million euro° what has caused the end the negotiations.
Zenit head of administrative and legal affairs Pavel Pivovarov told British television station Sky Sports on Monday that Barca's initial offer was not enough to secure Arshavin's services: "We have received only one firm offer - from FC Barcelona - but now we need to negotiate the transfer sum. Nothing is decided. It's about him, it's about the club, whether we will be satisfied with the offer. Now, we are not." Pivovarov later added to journalists: "If Barcelona would double their first offer, we would consider selling."
In an interview with Russian sports paper Sport-Express a few days ago, Arshavin seemed to accept the postion of his club: "I perfectly understand the position of Zenit: the offered transfer fee is really too low. It seems that with Barcelona pulling back, one of my options for next season has failed.
I nevertheless still want to leave Zenit and play in a stronger league. It's strange how things are going cause it seems that my good performance at the Euro is turning out bad for me since that made the price get higher. There's some time left, so maybe it will be fulfilled later on, but for now the dream stays a dream."
Last Friday, Zenit manager Dick Advocaat had announced that Arshavin wouldn't play anymore for his team until his future had been resolved. Arshavin nevertheless already started a Russian league match yesterday.
Asked about a last update, Arshavin's presumed agent Dennis Lachter says today in an interview with British tabloid The Daily Express that Zenit is asking 30 million euro° for the attacker: "Barcelona failed with a 15 million euro° bid for Andrei and now an English club have had a 25 million euro° offer rejected by Zenit. Zenit wants 30 million euro°, so clubs who want to sign Andrei will have to get closer to that figure.
And I believe they will because there are clubs interested in Andrei who are trying to sell other players first. The figure is not easy to reach, but the transfer activity is beginning to happen and I am still optimistic he will join a big club. I don’t know exactly when Andrei’s future will be resolved, but we have until the end of August, so we are both fairly relaxed."
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Thursday, 10 July 2008
Arshavin negotiations on a dead point
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10 comments:
15 million euro =
23 million us dollar
12 million british pound
25 million euro =
39 million us dollar
20 million british pound
30 million euro =
47 million us dollar
24 million british pound
Zenit's ridiculous asking price (30m!?) makes this highly unlikely. and if we sign Hleb will we really want him? Hleb has been proven in high-level club play, Arshavin has not.
by the way, do you have any info as to when that official announcement about Hleb is taking place, pep?
30 million euros is an absurd amount to pay for an unproven, 27-year-old player. Not to mention, the manner in which Spain (credit to Puyol) absolutely shut Arshavin down in the Euro game against Russion should have knocked a bit off his price tag. Maybe if he were a bit younger, this amount would be more understandable, but he's probably not going to get much better than he already is, and it would likely take him time to adapt to a new league with a significantly higher level of play than the level he is used to. Don't get me wrong, I like the guy, like his versatility, like the fact that he is a Barca fan, and I would love to see him in a Barca jersey, but not for 30 million. We could buy a younger guy who has proven himself in Spain or England for that amount.
Everyone just wants to take advantage of Barca...
While Arshavin comes with all the bells and whistles and fanfare - it's Hleb, the more grounded, and less "spectacular" of the two, who is actually the better player...I can't believe I just said that (given my less than flattering general opinion of Hleb) but in this case it's true. And given their respective ages, both 27, Hleb's a far more experienced player, having played against better competition throughout his career. Last but not least, take into account that Hleb could arrive for around half the price of Zenit's latest (rumored) asking price for Arshavin and it's a no brainer.
If I were Arshavin, I'd be having a full scale row with Zenit right about now. That is an absurd transfer fee, and Zenit doesn't really need it given who's investing in them.
They are trying to bow up and play big club. No one is going to pay that amount for Arshavin except Chelsea. I'm guessing Chelsea had the 25m offer rejected. They will pay over market for anyone.
Barca should not go higher than 15m. One tournament shouldn't double a price. That is just stupid logic.
Exactly. Zenit has small club-itis, that dread disease that makes little clubs see big clubs as one giant checkbook. They don't realize that Arshavin is but one of many. At that price, they clearly want to keep him, or figure if someone is stupid enough to meet it, more power to them.
Hleb is a very elegant solution to that problem. They even rejected a 25 million bid for that dude? Man!
I don't think it's a case of the team being cash strapped either as they are owned by Gazprom,the largest extractor of natural gas in the world! Zenit's just trying to "profit" from Arshavin's overall performance at the Euro's to overinflate his asking price like other clubs are doing simililarly. I don't hold it against Zenit for what they are doing, but they are hardly in a "needy" position to sell as is the case for some other european clubs.
Jean Michel Aulas is smiling somewhere. This is from his playbook.
Aulas. Ah, yes. He makes Del Nido seem like a punk in negotiations.
And everyone, I know that Pep is going to have a most excellent post about the board resignations today. But if anyone's antsy to start discussing it early, we have something going over at The Offside.
http://barcelona.theoffside.com/
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