Marco Silva has admitted he considers Fulham’s signing of Joao Palhinha and his subsequent sale to Bayern Munich as one of the best deals in the club’s history.
Silva has been speaking to A Bola in a wide-ranging interview, which the newspaper has released the second part of today.
One of the subjects discussed this time around was the signing of compatriots, namely Portuguese players, and how Fulham and himself have to be careful with such deals.
Fortunately, they have experience of doing those transfers well, with the signing of Palhinha the obvious point of reference in that regard.
He was signed in a €24.9m deal from Sporting Club de Portugal in 2022 and went on to make 79 appearances for the club, establishing himself as a key player and one of the leading defensive midfielders in Europe across that period.
He then moved to Bayern Munich for €51m last summer, handing Fulham a sizeable profit on their initial investment that has been carefully reinvested into the squad since.
Clubs of Fulham’s size often dream of doing such deals and Silva admits he thinks this one will go down as one of the best they’ve ever done.
“It was one of the best deals in the club’s history,” he said.
“In the last three years, since I arrived at Fulham, in addition to the results obtained, we have made a huge turnaround, in all aspects, not only in the team dynamics, but also in the relationship with the fans, which was very low.
“And we ended the stigma of Fulham being considered a yo-yo club, because they were unable to consistently perform at the highest level in English football. Today it is recognized as a good Premier League club. This was clearly our biggest victory, but naturally we want more.”
