Another day brings more Spanish claims on Swansea City and Nico Gaitan.
As some Spanish reports feel Zenit may now be the likeliest option for the Atletico Madrid squad player, AS insist Swansea City are still very much in the chase.
The Spanish newspaper say Swansea are ‘betting hard’ to sign the Argentine this month and have even offered to give him a wage increase.
Gaitan currently earns €2.6m a year at Atletico and whilst that doesn’t sound huge by Premier League standards, it sounds an awful lot more when it’s considered AS say the figure is after tax.
There’s no more from AS, it’s barely a sentence or two, but it’s the latest in a long line of Gaitan to Swansea City claims from the Spanish media.
At various stages it’s been claimed Gaitan isn’t keen on a move to the Premier League because he doesn’t speak English, and Swansea City haven’t offered enough to Atletico.
The Spanish club want ‘more than €15m’ for him, which seems a drop since two days ago when Marca said Atleti wanted €17-20m.
We don’t think Gaitan can speak Russian, so maybe this is one which can drag on until the close of the window.
Should Swansea get the player on a permanent deal there’s two obvious scenarios.
He could regain his Benfica form and help drag the club out of the relegation zone, or fail to settle like he has at Atletico, not adapt to the country or football, see his value plummet, and then end up on colossal wages facing a Championship season, with Swansea loaning him out (perhaps back to Benfica) whilst continuing to pay a percentage of that salary.
