After a dire need for a backup for José Holebas, Marco Silva addressed the situation at Watford by signing Marvin Zeegelaar from Sporting CP on transfer deadline day.
Getting their man for a fee believed to be around £3m, the Hornets will have had to deal with Bruno de Carvalho, the man currently in the news due to his ‘fight’ with West Ham’s owners over the William Carvalho saga.
Clearly managing to get it done and stroking the Sporting CP president’s ego in all the right ways, Watford pulled off something Sevilla were unable to.
Speaking to the local press on Monday, the La Liga club’s director of football, Óscar Arias, explained the reasons behind their failed attempt at signing the Dutch defender two weeks before his move to Vicarage Road.
He said: “We wanted to bring him in in, but, in the end, Sporting CP distanced themselves with requests that were out of place after negotiations were over, and, in that sense, the club was inflexible and it didn’t come off.”
While, at first glance, this seems to be about money, when it comes to dealing with Bruno Carvalho, even the smallest thing could cause the Portuguese man to make life hell for his counterparts.
What’s more surprising here is that Zeegelaar ended up going to Watford, managed by Marco Silva, whom the Sporting CP president sacked because the now Hornets manager wasn’t wearing the club suit.
