Inter Insist Balotelli and Maicon Aren’t for Sale; So Why Listen to Offers?
When you win both of your league’s domestic championships and you are crowned the Champions of Europe on top of that, you’re likely to get plenty of phone calls in the offseason.
That has been the case for Inter Milan as the reigning champions continue to hear transfer offers in order to lure some of their stars out.
Inter have already been offered large sums of money for Wesley Sneijder, Maicon, Mario Balotelli and Diego Milito just to namen a few. Some of those offers have been very lucrative but President Massimo Moratti has claimed the offers just haven’t been good enough and that those players are not for sale.
He has backed that up by re-signing Milito to a new four-year contract and is currently working on a new five-year deal to keep Sneijder around.
Meanwhile Real Madrid have already submitted a high bid for Maicon at 25 million euros as their new coach Jose Mourinho is trying to lure some of his old pupils to his new club.
Balotelli has also been a major transfer target. The 19- year old forward has been linked with a move to the Premier League, either to Chelsea, Manchester United or Manchester City. Moratti has rejected all bids so far saying the bids haven’t good enough. It’s also very difficult to let such a young thoroughbred like Balotelli leave when the rewards from him may be so high.
So with all the denials for transferring these players, you have to wonder why the Italian club are even listening to these offers.
Certainly one would argue that everybody has their price and if the club sells a player away, the monetary return would be huge. Valid point, but there’s got to be more important things than that.
If the team is insisting that they don’t intend to give up these talented young players, why would you even listen to other teams trying to lure your stars away? It’s hard to think that eventually the temptation will just get too high and Moratti will eventually sell one or two of his best players.
Also, the club has a new coach in Rafael Benitez and the Spaniard should get a chance to know all of his players before any deals are reached.
Inter should not be selling any players. Even if they wind up bringing in new players, that could affect the chemistry on the team. For the last five years, the club has dominated Italian football winning five straight scudettos and they capped it off this past season with their first Champions League crown since 1965.
Money cannot buy what the club has formed over the last few years. Despite older players retiring and others seeing their playing time reduced, the club has still managed to keep winning and one could argue that they actually have improved.
Now it’s time for Inter to close the door on the shopping sprees that clubs around Europe are intending to embark on this summer. Inter should be satisfied with what they are doing and focus on preparing their players for the upcoming season and getting accustomed to their new head coach who will likely make some tweaks from what Mourinho’s system gave Inter.
To avoid the temptation of reeling in piles of money, the team must just stop listening to other teams’ offers and continue doing what they’ve been doing the past few years. Since the Serie A scandal in 2006, Inter have won every league title and nothing should be tinkered with things going so well.
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