We love the Portuguese transfer market. We really do.
To talk about Sebastian Coates, since this could probably be our last story about him, we better start from the beginning.
In January 2016, Sunderland loaned the defender to Sporting CP on a one and a half season spell. The deal included a €5m buying option which could be activated until the end of this contract.
Coates impressed at Sporting, probably more so than Sunderland expected. But although the Portuguese papers said the club would be ready to use the buying option, they took a while to do so. So this indecision dragged on for seven months.
In the middle of this process, it was said that Sporting’s rivals Benfica would be keen on signing the player too. They would expect him not to agree with the Lions and then try to find a deal with Sunderland.
But as announced last night, Sporting finally found a deal with the player and his agent. It became a reason for their fans to mock Benfica. And they spent all night doing it.
To make things even worse, today A Bola wrote in their front page that the Uruguayan resisted Benfica’s approaches. It obviously drove them mad, and the club released an official statement denying they wanted to buy the player from Sunderland.
“Sport Lisboa e Benfica confirms what has already been expressly mentioned in a press conference by manager Rui Vitória, who has never been interested in hiring the player Coates.
The alleged interest that the newspaper A Bola returns to mention today that it existed is false information, already denied several times, lamenting the insistence on this type of news, which obviously are not at the service of the correct information of the readers.
Enlightenment is reinforced in the name of truth.”
According to A Bola, Coates now has a €50m release clause, making the Sunderland fee look tiny. He’ll be Sporting’s second best paid athlete.
