Napoli Transfer Tidbits

By: fortunato | June 7th, 2008

On the morning of the Euro 2008 kick off, I am sitting at my computer with rest of the family asleep reading up on some updates to the fast and furious rumours and I thought I would share them with you:

A few days ago, it appeared inevitable that Livorno defender Giovanni Pasquale was on his way over to the Partenopei in exchange for Erminio Rullo and some cash but now it appears that Udinese has swooped in and complicated matters. Pasquale’s agent recently stated that although Napoli would be a great place for his client to play, Livorno and Napoli had yet to hammer out a deal. Udinese has apparently upped the anti offering 2.5 million euros plus three or four players to Livorno in exchange for Pasquale. Personally, I never quite believed that Rullo and some cash could get us a starting left defender as solid and as proven as Pasquale but a few days ago, this seemed like a done deal. Well this all now has intensified the Porto Marek Cech rumors coming to Napoli again. It is hard to stay on top of all of this!

It has apparently been confirmed that Napoli has offered the Argentine club, Independiente, 8 million euros for their 27 year old striker German Gustavo Denis. Word has it that the sought after Denis is also being targeted by the French club, Paris Saint-Germain and they have also offered an undisclosed amount of cash. The Argentine journalists have stated that they figure Denis would prefer Napoli as a destination for numerous reasons, one being he is a friend of Mr. Lavezzi. German’s stats show that he has pumped n 44 goals in 65 games with Independiente since 2006 and was recently rewarded by playing for the Argentine national team as part of the 2010 World Cup qualification warm ups. Denis’ name has also surfaced in transfer rumours to Liverpool recently.

Maybe the reason for targeting a grand bomber like Denis is the fact that there may have never been any truth at all to Napoli targeting Schalke striker Kevin Kuranyi. In the early part of the week this story was all over the transfer rumor web pages that Napoli had set their sights squarely on the 26 year old, 6’3” German Kuranyi. Just yesterday, Kuranyi’s agent advised all that there was no truth at all to any of the rumors and that the whole thing was a media fantasy. The agent went on to say that if his client is on the market, his guess would be he’d move to England. Earlier in the week, rumors had it that Napoli had offered in upwards of 12 million euros for Kuranyi, a tall and talented striker with quite and imposing look about him.

Napoli DG Pierpaolo Marino was interviewed recently and he advised that there was never any truth to rumored offers being made to him about either Domizzi or Iezzo, as both players had been linked to a Roma transfer. Marino stated that Iezzo has another two years on his contract and as of now is still considered Napoli’s starting keeper. As fo Iezzo himself, San Gennaro states that he wants to remain in azzurri colours and truly doesn’t believe he will play anywhere other than Napoli next season. This I don’t believe. I believe both Iezzo and Domizzi, have played their last games for us.
Marino also denied any serious interest in Roma striker Mauro Esposito or in Sampdoria’s Christian Maggio (whose agent went on record stating that Maggio would be honored to play for Napoli). Lastly Marino wouldn’t comment on the supposed 28 million euros recently turned down by Marino by an undisclosed club interested in acquiring Marek Hamsik but he did state, yet again, that Marek isn’t going anywhere.

That’s it for now. Enjoy the Euro tournament.