Leicester needed a goal against Manchester City on Saturday afternoon. But Brendan Rodgers still didn’t bring his £30 million forward off the bench.
Then again, this hardly came as a surprise.
Three years after arriving from Newcastle United, Ayoze Perez is little more than an afterthought these days. The Spaniard has started just once in the Premier League all season, playing a grand total of just 124 minutes. He’s found the net in one of his last 26 top-flight appearances too.
Perez’s contract now expires in less than 12 months’ time. As such, any hopes Leicester may have harboured about making back a fraction of their £30 million investment look destined to go up in smoke.
Ayoze Perez dreaming of La Liga after Leicester City exit
According to AS, Perez would be willing to rip up his contract in order to facilitate a return to Spain; thereby foregoing the remainder of his £45,000-a-week deal. A former Tenerife youngster who once flirted hopefully with some of Spain’s biggest clubs, Perez has never played a single La Liga game.
With his 30th birthday approaching, he still hopes to do just that. Before it’s too late.
In fact, it was Perez’s desire to make an impression on Spanish soil that encouraged him to rebuff the advances of Fulham, Crystal Palace and Everton over the summer. The one-time Magpies favourite, AS say, turned down the aforementioned top-flight trio. He has little interest in extending a now-eight-year stay in Britain.
Whether Perez would have been guaranteed first-team football at Fulham, Palace or Everton, then, is a bit of a moot point. The silky forward would have known deep down that, by seeing out his contract at Leicester, he was consigning himself to a season wasted on the sidelines.
But if Perez finally gets his wish and finds himself playing La Liga football for the very first time in 2023/24, all that waiting might just be worth it.
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