For months the Portuguese press have been covering Sporting CP’s stance on selling Viktor Gyökeres this summer.
After he decided to stay in Lisbon for another year, despite interest last summer, the player, his agent Hasan Çetinkaya, sporting director Hugo Viana, who has since left for Manchester City, and president Frederico Varandas all sat down to discuss a way forward.
As has been [reported countless times since](https://sportwitness.co.uk/salary-sacrifice-and-gentlemans-agreement-means-arsenal-can-sign-player-e30m-cheaper/#:~:text=Gy%C3%B6keres%20struck%20a%20deal%20with,turning%20down%20a%20salary%20increase.), an agreement was made that the 27-year-old could move for less than his €100m release clause this summer, with the fee put at somewhere in the region of €60-75m.
Arsenal, Manchester United, Juventus and others have all been repeatedly linked since, and there’s been various articles in Portugal suggesting Sporting have changed their mind and will ask for more, believing the figures mentioned above are too low. The plan would be to use competition, and they’d hope that came from the likes of Arsenal, Manchester United, Juventus and other clubs, to edge the amounts higher.
[Record](http://record.pt) report this hasn’t gone down well with Gyökeres and his camp.
_‘Gyökeres is “furious”, as sources close to the striker describe to Record,’_ which makes it sound like they’ve been speaking to the player’s agent.
Varandas now wants €80m, having assured the player that €60m plus €10m in bonuses payments would be enough.
To explain the drama, the Portuguese newspaper state: _‘More than that, Record knows that Varandas and Hugo Viana, then the Lions’ football director, offered Gyökeres an extra bonus of 500 thousand euros gross, if the striker scored 50 goals + assists, to motivate him to stay. After the meeting between the parties, last September, Viana sent the player’s representatives audio and written messages with the summary of the meeting, communications that Gyökeres’ agents have in their possession and that, our newspaper has found, they now admit to making public in the media, to prove the commitment that exists and the respective terms – namely the promise to let Gyökeres leave for €60M + €10M –, in a scenario in which the rupture between the player and the club could escalate._
_‘Another source close to the process, not only denies the existence of official proposals, but also details that in the aforementioned meeting it was explained to the player that the club would not demand the value of the clause due to his age (26 years old at the time of the events), but stated that the president did not set a value to release him. This version is disputed by HCM, the agency that represents Gyökeres, and which has messages that prove this.’_
Four clubs are interested at this stage and _‘want to buy’_ the Sweden international’, report Record, with those clubs named as Arsenal, Manchester United, Juventus and Al-Hilal. All four have _‘expressed their intention to make offers’_ for the player.
When his agent Hasan Çetinkaya informed Benfica of this, he’s said to have been told by the club’s general director Bernardo Palmeiro that the cost is €80m.
Whether any of Arsenal, Manchester United or Juventus are willing to pay that remains to be seen, as it’s unlikely Gyökeres fancies a move to Saudi Arabia.
As is often the case, there’s likely going to be an agreement in the middle, unless the player’s agent fancies all out war against Sporting.