After months of rumours that Chelsea could activate Maurizio Sarri’s €8m release clause, the date they needed to do it by has now come and gone, as it expired when we entered the month of June.
Despite being sacked by Aurelio de Laurentiis and replaced by Carlo Ancelotti, the Italian’s contract with Napoli is, according to Italian law, still valid, meaning the club’s president will continue to pay him his €120k/month wages for the foreseeable future.
Corriere dello Sport cover all of this on Friday in an article about the situation, bringing in some rather good news in the process.
While the expiration of the release clause could be problematic for Chelsea and, theoretically, places de Laurentiis in a great position to negotiate more money out of whichever club is interested in Sarri’s services, the Italian newspaper believe €8m should still be enough to convince him to let his former manager go.
After all, even Bruno de Carvalho, Sporting CP’s eccentric (we’re being kind here) owner, who makes the Napoli president come across as a saint, would probably prefer to receive €8m than pay someone €120k/month over the next two years.
Spite only goes so far.
There’s also the option of handing Sarri a contract and hiring him regardless of his Napoli situation, but that would most likely end up in a long and probably expensive legal battle that no one really wants to take part in.
For now, we’ll just have to wait and see, as Antonio Conte remains Chelsea’s manager for now.
