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.
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.