After reports of interest on Thursday, Portuguese newspaper A Bola today comes up with a story today saying Liverpool have indeed decided to sign Gelson Martins in this transfer window.
The outlet is now claiming that the Reds are preparing to make a bid of between €40m and €45m for the player, at least to try to convince the Portuguese club to sit and talk about the transfer.
But this offer could still not be enough to take him, and the information today is that even the payment of his €60m release clause could be turned down by the Portuguese side.
This is typical Portuguese positioning.
A Bola claims there’s a clause in Gelson Martins’ contract which means Sporting don’t have to accept his release, as long as they give him a new deal.
The club would have to raise his release clause to €80m and give Gelson a big pay raise. Still, they wouldn’t be able to offer him anything close to the €3.5m per year which Liverpool have put on the table.
These are strange claims to make, since it’s called ‘release clause’ for a reason. In any case, we’re pretty sure Sporting would accept much less than €60m from Liverpool for Gelson Martins.
