It has been alleged that Unai Emery and NSWE chose to match the £25 million asking price for an exciting young defender, allowing Aston Villa to jump ahead of both Arsenal and Manchester City for that player.
Villa planning for Champions League despite recent stumble
Whatever happens in the last few days of the season, Aston Villa’s incredible campaign will be regarded as a success. But Emery’s team is only starting to fade away in the Premier League, and they will play their hardest matches yet in the upcoming weeks when they play Ligue 1 powerhouse LOSC Lille in the UEFA Conference League quarterfinals.
Emery and Villa already appear to be planning for that eventuality and will be keen to do their business early. To that end, they may have just landed their first deal.
Emery’s team will obviously need reinforcements for the upcoming season, especially if they want to compete in the newly-formed Champions League in addition to the Premier League, which would require players to play even more games than they did last season. Currently, seven players are sidelined due to injury.
Emery and Villa seem to be anticipating that possibility and will want to complete their transaction as soon as possible. In light of this, they might have recently closed their first deal.
Kadioglu Villa bound after fee agreed this week
This is in the form of ferocious full-back Ferdi Kadioglu, for whom Villa is supposedly in the driver’s seat right now and has even reached an agreement to bring him to the Midlands. In recent transfer windows, Arsenal and Manchester City have expressed interest in signing Fenerbahçe’s outstanding player, but he ultimately chose to remain in Turkey.
It appears that will change now. Turkish publication Aksam reports that Kadioglu has already “said goodbye” to Fenerbahce in preparation for his move to Aston Villa, which was made possible in large part by Unai Emery’s “insistence” on signing the player.
In addition, they state that the deal is “expected to become official in the summer” and that Villa has consented to pay the 30 million euros “requested by Fenerbahce.” This amount establishes Kadioglu as the joint-highest sale in Super Liga history, together with Sacha Boey’s January transfer to Bayern Munich.
Talent scout Jacek Kulig called Kadioglu a “future superstar,” and he’s already started to fulfil that potential. When healthy, the 24-year-old Fenerbahce player has missed just two minutes of action all season, helping the team contend for the Turkish championship. He can play on either side of defence.
Currently earning £48,000 per week, he is likely set for a sizeable increase to that if and when he makes the move to the Midlands this summer, and could well see a change of position from his usual left-back berth under Emery, with Alex Moreno already a strong option on that side.
