One of the more active transfer sagas of the January transfer window’s last week was the question mark surrounding Islam Slimani’s future.
The Algeria international is currently loaned by Leicester City to Monaco, where, despite starting in great form, things aren’t going so well these days.
Pushed to one side by Robert Moreno, Slimani wanted to find himself a new club for the second half of the season, and a number were interested.
Names like Manchester United (who eventually loaned Odion Ighalo), Tottenham, Aston Villa and even Inter were mentioned, but the striker eventually stayed in the principality, where he will now finish the 2019/20 campaign.
Looking back at the whole situation, Compétition in Algeria went digging for a bit more information and spoke to a French agent about what happened.
He said: “At first, Leicester were asking for €2.5m and Monaco €4.5m (to cut the deal short), so a total of €7m. Sorry, but no club is going to spend that money for a six month loan.
“On Thursday, after realising the amount would put off any club, the two parties agreed for a new amount of €5m when they learned Inter came knocking for Slimani. On Thursday, we actually thought a transfer would be done, but there was never an offer from the Milan club”.
Slimani remains contracted to the King Power Stadium until 2021, and is currently out with a muscle injury, meaning he was helpless in watching Monaco succumb to their third league defeat in a row on Saturday as they were defeated 3-1 by Nîmes Olympique.
While it was once believed the Ligue 1 side would end up buying the forward, it seems he will now return to Leicester come the end of the season, where Brendan Rodgers will have to decide what to do with him.
