More than four years after Lille OSC sold Victor Osimhen (25) to Serie A. The president of the Ligue 1 club has now openly said how much they put into the deal.
During the summer of 2020, Les Dogues signed Osimhen to SSC Napoli for €70 million, with the potential to rise to €80 million with add-one, a record for the Italian club at the time.
The Nigerian's value has risen significantly during his time at Lille, where he was named the club's Player of the Season in 2019/20.
Osimhen flourished in Serie A for a few seasons and helped Napoli win the league title in the 2022/2023 season. As for Lille, they won the Ligue 1 title in their first season without him in 2020/21.
Club chairman Olivier Létang says they did not get as much money for his sale as one might think. Speaking to L'Équipe, Létang says they only collected €7 million as part of that deal, due to commissions, brokerage fees and capital gains. There were no retro commissions at the time, according to Lille's president, who added: “LOSC made a lot more money selling Carlos Baleba (€30 million to Brighton & Hove Albion) and Amadou Onana (€40 to Everton) . ”
That small amount of money earned by the man currently on loan to Galatasaray is one of the many mysteries researchers are trying to unravel.
Investigations into that deal and others around that time are being reviewed by French and Italian courts to shed light on those deals.
GFFN | Joel Lefèvre
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