Everton will have to wait until August if they wish to sign Panathinaikos full-back Georgios Vagiannidis as they want him for the Champions League match against Russell Martin’s Rangers.
That’s according to Record, who report that Sporting Club de Portugal are pushing to get the Greek defender this summer.
The newspaper reports that Sporting have already seen a €10m plus €2m offer rejected by Panathinaikos, who own the player’s rights entirely. Even the presence of Bernardo Palmeiro, Sporting’s director of football, who travelled to London last week to push the deal through, was not enough.
The Greek club are willing to negotiate for the right-back but only intend to do so in August after they Champions League qualifying round against Rangers.
They have other interested clubs too, notably in England, where it is Everton and Wolves, and Italy, in the form of Atalanta. Thus, there is no need to rush into a sale at this point.
They instead want to keep their player for that Champions League game and then perhaps have Everton, and the others duel it out in August and even create something of an auction to get themselves a better price as well.
