Twitter today is full of a rumour that Thiago is set to stay at
Barcelona after receiving an offer to double his money. It sounds quite
similar to something we covered yesterday, a Twitter rumour gone a bit
crazy. The two main accounts Tweeting the 'news' are @CentreTransfer and
@DeadlineDayLive, that may sound like nothing, just some Twitter
accounts spreading false rumours, but combined they have close to
300,000 followers which means the story has now spread like wildfire and
become something of a 'fact'.
Both accounts say they have got the information from Spanish
newspaper AS. Obviously the first place to check to see what truth was
behind the reports was AS. So we did, expecting a huge front-page spread
we found a story about the Spanish national team instead. Nothing on
page 2 about Thiago, page 3, 4, nothing in the newspaper at all about
the player being close to agreeing new terms with Barcelona.
It's been entirely made up, it's not on their Spanish website either,
or on their English one, we can only assume someone has made it up to
gain some followers on the social network. The tactic is certainly
working for both the accounts.
What
AS actually do say about Thiago is interesting. They haven't done a
lengthy piece, the situation hit saturation point in Spain and they've
all got a bit bored of it. However, they reckon that Manchester United
want the deal completed soon, which would obviously give David Moyes a
huge boost in his first week at Old Trafford.
In order to do this they are willing to pay Barcelona more than the
player's buy-out clause. The current La Liga champions had been trying
every trick in the book to bend the buy-out clause to make it less
appealing, including threatening the player with a hefty tax bill.
Manchester United are to said hope that by offering around
€22m, as opposed to the buy-out clause of
€18m,
that they can get the player with less fuss and before any other club
get into detailed personal negotiations with Thiago and his
representatives.
Mazinho has also requested a clause which means his son is likely to
get games at Manchester United or can leave for a similar fee to what
they bought him for, that's also been reported elsewhere. Paying an
extra few million to make the transfer easier also shows Thiago how much
Manchester United want him and how they are willing to try and keep him
out of the situation, Barcelona had brought up the tax issue because
they wanted the clause personally from the player.
The extra effort from the new regime at Manchester United could help
smooth things along and they may get their wish of securing the player
to give David Moyes a brilliant first week.
Maggio is refusing to give up on the prolific attacker and wants Cavani to stay put.
"Julio Cesar will move on," Redknapp told talkSPORT.
