Pedro looks set to join Chelsea in the coming days, after Marca reported that the Barcelona winger arrived in London on Wednesday for a medical with the Premier League champions.
It's said that a deal was agreed between the two sides late on Tuesday night, with the Blues offering an initial fee of €28m with an extra €2m in add-ons to edge out the €25m plus €5m in add-ons supposedly offered by Manchester United.
All the talk for the last couple of weeks has involved United being on the brink of bringing the 28-year-old to the Premier League, with some reports even saying that they'd agreed basic personal terms with him, but it appears that their unwillingness to be flexible in their bid has allowed Chelsea to sneak past them and steal Pedro from under their noses. This comes despite reports on Tuesday that United's Ed Woodward had flown out to Spain in order to negotiate the deal himself in person, with Sky Sports' Guillem Balague claiming that the winger had agreed personal terms with United and the clubs had only to agree exactly how the Red Devils would pay the forward's fee.
Pedro was in Luis Enrique's starting XI for Barcelona's Spanish Super Cup defeat to Athletic Bilbao, playing 68 minutes before being taken off. Manager Enrique defended the decision, saying: "It's a difficult situation and it's hard to stay focused. I look forward to the end of the market so I know which players I have for sure. But I saw Pedro ready to give his maximum."
Enrique also admitted in recent days that Pedro wanted to leave the Spanish champions in order to get more first-team football: "We've heard his opinions, it's a difficult decision that he has to make but we'll wait and see what he decides. He wants to leave because he's not getting minutes but we want to give him minutes so it's a difficult situation. I certainly want him to stay."
0 comments:
Post a Comment