L’Affaire Eto’o, a.k.a. “Transfer wheat from the chaff”

By: Kevin | June 10th, 2009

And so it begins. We’ve recapped the season, and Isaiah doled out a most excellent State of the Liga post. It’s Silly Season time, when everybody and their mamas are for sale.

Or not.

Club presidents meet to discuss the fate of all of their stars.

Or not.

We are in a rare position of having just come off of the most successful season of any Spanish club, period, full stop. The question now is where do we go from here? The last time we had major success, grabbing the double in double-ought-six, we stood pat.

And look where that got us.

So the real question is, what do we do?

Without question, our most unsettled player is Samuel Eto’o. We all know his stats, we all know what he brings to the table. Dependent upon what/who/tea leaves/discarded sports rag you read, he’s going to be signed for life, or sold first chance the side gets.

All that we know for sure is that he is in the last year of a contract, the “go or renew” year. We have to renew him now, sell him if we can’t/don’t want to, or risk having him leave on a free.

That’s what we know. Everything else is speculation.

Laporta has been saying nice things about our Samu.

Txiki and Guardiola have been silent. Is this because they’re holed up with a “who’s available” chart of European players?

Um, that’s in the “don’t know” category.

Latest news, coming from El Mundo Deportivo, is that a deal has been reached with Inter for Ibrahimovic. This is, if my math is correct, about the third time that this has happened. Yet both players are still where they are.

Sez EMD, here’s the deal: Eto’o+10m for Ibrahimovic. L’Equipe and Sport say that Eto’o jetted away from the Cameroon practice to Italy, to meet with Mourinho to discuss Inter’s plans, and that AC Milan might be in the picture.

Hmmm. Inter will suddenly accept, for a player whom they valued at 80m just last week, a Cranky Cameroonian and Laporta’s pocket change?

Despite all the effusion coming from Laporta, there’s no question that the silence from Txiki and Guardiola has been deafening. This is the biggest issue that we have to solve, and here’s my view, in a single word:

SELL

I know what he’s done for the club, and I know what he can do for the club. Every goal is loved and appreciated, so let’s nip those howls right in the bud.

But….

–He’s in the last year of a contract that, frankly, if he were interested in renewing, would have been done by now on both sides of the aisle, his and ours.

–We absolutely canNOT risk him leaving on a free.

–I just don’t think he wants to be here, and hasn’t since the side tried to sell him last summer. His excellent year was to present the best possible picture for his upcoming European auction.

–We won’t have the same year, if we have the same attack. It’s easy to say “we won the treble, why change anything?” It was the same thought for ‘07, and somebody please tell me what we won that season.

So. There are press reports, and absolutely nothing is a reality, except that Eto’o is available, and Ibrahimovic wants to leave Inter, for a club that has a shot at Champions League glory.

The rest is for us to natter about. What say ye, everyone?