With Mohamed Salah a renewal with Liverpool, and Vinicius Junior has to do the same in Real Madrid, Saudi -Arabia is looking for their next tent. After the departure of Neymar Junior back to Brazil in January, his former club Al-Hilal wants to bring a star forward.
In recent days, Saudi officials traveled to Barcelona this summer to discuss potential deals, with four players who are a lot on their radar. The answer from the Blaugrana was no to all their sale – at least for the time being – which showed that situation. One of the names on their list was another Brazilian star, Raphinha, who has enjoyed the best season of his career so far and even mentioned as a balloon d'Or.
According to 365 scores, as worn by sport, Saudi Arabia have already drawn up the conditions of a potential deal for Raphinha. They would be willing to offer the 28-year-old a deal of four years worth € 200 million, or € 50 million per season. That would be a wage increase from somewhere between six and ten times what he currently earns in Barcelona. In the meantime, Barcelona would be established in terms of transfer costs to get € 100 million from the deal.
That would meet the reported price tag of € 80-90 million that Barcelona has set him up. There seem to be some who believe that this is the ideal time to cash in Raphinha, but with the Brazilian wanting, negotiations are going on at the same time.
In recent months, Raphinha has openly talked about his plans to leave the club last summer and to feel unwanted by the club, but noted that Hansi Flick convinced him to stay in Spain. It seems unlikely that Raphinha would be willing to leave at the height of his career, after he has rejected an offer to go to the middle -east last summer.