Roma’s general manager Tiago Pinto discussed a few transfer market topics in an interview with La Gazzetta dello Sport.
“Our goal is to vie for a Champions League berth, but there’s a lot of competition. We have what it takes to pursue this objective until the end. We signed 14 new players in the last year and a half, investing €150M. If we had told the fans two years ago, they wouldn’t have believed us.”
The director replied to whether the Davide Frattesi deal was impossible because of the Financial Fair Play.
“Exactly. With all the restrictions, the answer is obvious. There’s no chance right now. Georginio Wijnaldum will return in January, and we already have Bryan Cristante, Nemanja Matic, Edoardo Bove, Ben Tahirovic, and Mady Camara.”
“Rick Karsdorp didn’t show up for practice after the Sassuolo game and refused to come to Japan with us. We collaborated with his entourage behind the scenes. He returned, practiced, and played. Somebody decided to overstep their duties, ruining the work we had done to mend fences. He’s for sale, but he won’t leave for free. If he departs, we’ll look to preserve balance of the roster, not necessarily adding a new fullback.”
Tiago Pinto was quizzed about Portugal targeting José Mourinho.
“When you sign somebody like him, you have to be prepared for the rumors. It’s not the first time he receives interest. It wasn’t a distraction. We count on the fact that we’ll continue together.”
“We want to keep Chris Smalling, and he has to give us an answer. He has a clause to become a free agent. We invested a lot on him and waited when he was injured. He knows we care about him.”
 |
Follow us on Google News for more updates on Serie A and Italian football |