Goncalo Ramos should be worth double the fee Chelsea paid for Mykhaylo Mudryk after his Champions League heroics for Benfica, former Russia international Igor Korneev tells Record of the reported Newcastle United target.
Cody Gakpo is not the only high-profile attacker Southampton missed out on last summer. The Saints held talks to sign Portugal international Ramos in August too; chairman Henrik Kraft indicating, in conversation with The Athletic, that a deal was ‘very close’ to being agreed at the time.
Imagine swapping Che Adams and Theo Walcott for Cody Gakpo and Goncalo Ramos. Oh what might have been, Southampton fans.
Gakpo joined Liverpool in January and the Ramos ship has long since sailed too. A Bola say that Benfica expect to lose their talismanic forward this summer but – after selling Darwin Nunez and Enzo Fernandez for colossal fees – they are likely to demand that anyone hoping to lure Ramos away from the Estadio da Luz pays the £107 million release clause in his contract.
Will Goncalo Ramos leave Benfica for Newcastle United?
“I believe he will be transferred for around 120 million euros,” says Korneev, the former Barcelona midfielder.
“If Mudryk was bought for 100 million euros, then he is worth 200 million.”
Newcastle United, The Chronicle say, have been keeping tabs on Ramos since last year. One of the most instinctive and technically-gifted forwards on the market, Ramos took his tally to 23 goals from 34 games (26 if you count that World Cup hat-trick against Switzerland) with a brace during Benfica’s 5-1 Champions League thrashing of Club Brugge in midweek; a result which cost Scott Parker his job.
Mudryk, meanwhile, is facing an avalanche of criticism just weeks after joining Chelsea in what was – until Fernandez arrived, that is – the club’s all-time record signing.
“You all see that he works and wants to develop,” says Ukraine’s interim coach Ruslan Rotan. (Mudryk) will get over it all. I think it would be better if he joined Mikel Arteta (at Arsenal).”
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