Napoli made €40m offer for player before Leicester City beat them to the transfer

Napoli face Leicester City in the Europa League on Thursday evening, so the match and the Foxes generally are getting a lot of coverage in Italy.

The biggest story surrounding the game relates to whether all of the Serie A club’s squad will be allowed to travel to the UK for the match. Some spent time in red list countries during the international break, and it’s not yet clear whether an exception will be made.

On another note, Corriere del Mezzogiorno, via Area Napoli, report that there’s one of the Leicester City squad who could instead be playing for Napoli right now. When at Lille, Boubakary Soumare was of great interest to the Italian club’s sporting director, Cristiano Giuntoli.

So keen were Napoli that they made a €40m offer to Lille in January 2020. At the time, the French club didn’t want to sell the midfielder, and rejected the huge bid, however, this summer they’ve been forced into several sales, one of which saw the player move to Leicester City.

Giuntoli will now get to watch Soumare close-up this week, should Brendan Rodgers select him, with bittersweet feelings.