We joke about it often at Sport Witness, but sometimes, offers you can’t refuse really exist, and clubs are forced to accept them somewhat reluctantly.
This is, in essence, what happened at Marseille when Fulham came knocking on their door with a €30m offer for André Franck Zambo Anguissa.
Speaking to La Provence, the Ligue 1 side’s director of football, Andoni Zubizarreta, revealed how the transfer came about.
He said: “The English transfer market was shutting on the Thursday. I left the training centre on the Wednesday evening, and Fulham’s offer was too low. I went home thinking he would be staying. The next morning at 7am, I get a phone call from the club president telling me they upped their offer to €30m.
“That’s how his exit took place. It was a crazy day. The original aim was to keep the team together barring any ‘over the top’ offers that you cannot refuse.”
Despite letting him go, Zubizarreta would have liked to see the now Fulham defensive midfielder stay, as he felt he still had room to grow at Marseille, having just come off his first full season with the French side.
As he puts it, sometimes, you just have to work with ‘realities’ and make the decisions based on what’s in front of you.
And to show there’s nothing but love coming from the south of France, he added: “I’m happy for him. He’s going to have a nice career in English football.”
Since arriving at Fulham, the 22-year-old has made eight appearances in all competitions, and started in the 3-0 loss to Everton at the weekend.
