Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho has played down reports on signing Juan Cuadrado and has rubbished talks regarding imminent exits for Andre Schurrle and Mohammed Salah. The Special One said, “I shouldn’t make any comments about players from other clubs. You speak about Cuadrado, you can speak about 10, 20 players.It’s my job to know them all. I think he fits well in Fiorentina’s squad and Colombia’s squad, not in Chelsea’s squad.”
We had reported a couple of days ago that the Stamford Bridge side are plotting a move to bring Cuadrado to London and would be thus inclined to sell Schurrle and Salah to fund the transfer for the dazzling Colombian.
Cuadrado was linked heavily with Manchester United in the summer but despite intense speculations, he preferred to stay in Italy. The 26 year old then signed a contract extension with the Viola and his release clause now stands at €35m (£26m). The versatile youngster though is the priority signing for Chelsea in the summer.
In fact, Gianluca Di Marzio staff David Amoyal claimied that Cuadrado’s agent was expected to fly to to London to hold talks over the transfer move.
Cuadrado’s agent heads to London to meet with Chelsea http://t.co/tfiC5TlQko
— David Amoyal (@DavidAmoyal) January 22, 2015
The report claims that Cuadrado’s agent, Alessandro Lucci, went to London after completing Luis Muriel’s move to Sampdoria from Udinese a few days back. This came despite Fiorentina manager Vincenzo Montella making it clear he doesn’t want to lose his prized asset “As of today, there is no possibility Cuadrado will leave Fiorentina.”
However ahead of Saturday’s FA Cup fourth-round tie with Bradford, Mourinho said (reported by the Independent), “The club doesn’t move. We don’t move. Our desire is to keep the same squad. The window is open, but what I can say is I like them, I need them and I trust them.”
“We are happy with the players, we are happy with the work we did in the summer to prepare for the season, (it) reflects the trust we have in the group and, if possible, we don’t want to be involved in the transfer window.”
The Portuguese also mentioned that it would take a phenomenal offer for Schurrle to leave the club, “The principle is that we would like him to stay. The question is not to be allowed or not allowed. The question is to have a phenomenal offer and a player to be super keen of accepting a new challenge in his career. We don’t want to sell our players.”
In fact German side Wolfsburg are reportedly ready to pay £23m for Schürrle, but the World Cup winner would prefer to join Dortmund. Moreover, Roma could also offer a small fee to take Salah on loan for the rest of the season with the option to then sign him for around £12m in the coming summer.
In fact today’s report from the trusted TMW website from Italy says Salah is open to make a move away from Chelsea and would like to join Roma. It is believed that the winger loves the project of the Giallorossi and there now remains only an agreement to be reached before Salah joins Roma.
The Gianluca Di Marzio website have reported a few hours back that should Chelsea fail to sign Cuadrado they would turn their attention to Shakhtar Donetsk’s Douglas Costa who seems like a more feasible option than Cuadrado at the moment.
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