Blaise Matuidi denied he was close to returning to PSG in the summer: “It was all false. I have always said that I am fine at Juventus. I have been a PSG fan since I was kid and playing for them allowed me to fulfill a dream of mine. However, I am proud to play in one of best clubs in the world now.” The 32-year-old Frenchman has begun the season with an expiring contract after inking a two-year one last summer.
On the competition in the squad: “It stimulates me. Nobody gifts you anything in football, you have to earn your spot. If I am here it is because I have always been ready on the pitch.”
On racism in Italy: “I have had this problem too, Romelu Lukaku had to deal with it recently. It is necessary to take action, there is no room for it in football and in life in general. We do not want to see that, it is an awful example for the kids and we will do everything in our power to stop it, even though the incidents involve a small part of the fans. There is no room for them at the stadia. We discussed that last season too, we do not want those people to have their way. The proper institutions must take the right decisions.”
Juventus have been practicing without 12 players who are with their respective national teams this week: coach Maurizio Sarri has been able to take part to the practices and has healed from pneumonia, while Aaron Ramsey has ramped up his activity after a rough summer and took part to the scrimmage with the U-23 team yesterday. He is poised to be called up for the Fiorentina match after missing the first two for lack of conditioning and a back problem.
FIFA released the candidates for the FIFpro Men’s World 11 2019 and four Bianconeri made the list: Giorgio Chiellini, who is the only Italian player, Cristiano Ronaldo, Alex Sandro and Matthijs De Ligt, obviously for what he did at Ajax, and also Joao Cancelo, who joined Manchester City. Gianluigi Buffon has been left off for the first time since 2005.
Calcio & Finanza analyzed the financial impact of the recent transfer market window: the Old Lady acquired eight player spending €181.7M, two of which (Luca Pellegrini and Cristiano Romero) have then been loaned out. In four cases, the main acquisitions, the club has benefitted from a recent law that reduces the taxes on the wages of professionals that move to Italy from abroad. The site estimates that the combined amortization, which is simplistically the weight of the players on the balance sheets, is €37.6M and the new salaries amount to €43.6M. The sales of Moise Kean and Joao Cancelo for a total of €92M generated a €55.7M net profit ad freed up €6.2M in wages.
Most of the minor but numerous operations that brought in cash, such as the deals involving Riccardo Orsolini, Emil Audero, Stefano Sturaro, Alberto Cerri and Andrea Favilli, were completed before June 30th and will be included in the 2018/2019 financial report that will be presented on September 16th. A recent Exor document indicated the club was in the red for €40M.
Considering the return of Gonzalo Higuain, the pay roll has increased by 49M (25%) while the amortizations by €22.7M. With an expected revenue of €555M, the roster is projected to cost 72% of it, which is slightly above the recommendable percentage to be considered totally sustainable but up by 17% compared to this past season. The management can obviously rectify the situation in January or by June 30th 2020.
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