While prying a player of Camavinga’s calibre away from Madrid seems an impossible task on paper, Al-Ittihad believe there is an angle to exploit. Since arriving from Rennes in 2021, Camavinga has won every trophy available in club football, including the Champions League and La Liga. However, his individual status within the squad remains a point of contention.
The 23-year-old has often found himself rotated in and out of the starting XI, a situation that has persisted through the tenures of Carlo Ancelotti, Xabi Alonso and now current boss Alvaro Arbeloa. With Arbeloa only taking the reins in January following Alonso's dismissal, the hierarchy at Madrid is still in a state of transition. The fierce competition in the engine room, featuring Aurelien Tchouameni, Federico Valverde and Jude Bellingham, means Camavinga is not always the first name on the team sheet, having started just nine games in La Liga this season and three in the Champions League.
Furthermore, his versatility has sometimes been a curse, with the Frenchman frequently deployed as a makeshift left-back rather than in his preferred central midfield role. Al-Ittihad hope that the promise of being the undisputed star of the team, playing in his favoured position every week, could turn the player's head.