Aston Villa may need to work hard if they want to sign goalkeeper Álvaro Valles in the summer transfer window, with insistence that he’s going to return to Real Betis.
Estadio Deportivo cover the player today as he prepares for the summer as a free agent after leaving Las Palmas on February 10th.
The newspaper explains that Valles is likely to be talked about plenty this week as Betis take on Las Palmas at the Benito Villamarín on Sunday.
He’s been linked with a return to Betis, where he came through as a youngster before leaving on a free transfer in 2018, for months and the Gran Canarian press was busy this week detailing the offer that Betis had made him.
A move never happened, and he eventually agreed to leave Las Palmas on a free last month to save them four months of his contract. He’s since been discussing that, as well as the phone call he received from Monchi at Aston Villa in January too.
It was believed that call from the Spaniard was a prelude to the summer, when Aston Villa will need to replace Robin Olsen. That, however, may be a wasted effort.
They say that despite Marseille, Villarreal and Aston Villa all wanting to sign him in January, the goalkeeper was ‘adamant in his refusal’. That was because he wanted to wait for Betis.
Indeed, his recent comments that he is a man of ‘fixed ideas’ was further testament of his desire to return to his former club. In other words, Aston Villa would have to do something special to convince him to change his mind.
That’s always possible, of course, particularly with Monchi on the case and Premier League money to offer but Valles seems to have his heart set on Betis for now.
