Real Madrid will block any January offers for Luka Jovic amid claims that West Ham United and Leicester City want to bring the Serbian striker to the Premier League, according to Defensa Central.
But do not assume this means that Zinedine Zidane sees the £59 million man as a key part of his starting XI at the Santiago Bernabeu.
Refusing to let Jovic go in the winter feels more like a classic case of a club not wanting to lose a squad member in a month where signing a replacement is notoriously difficult.
The former Eintracht Frankfurt goal-machine might not have come close to justifying his eye-watering price-tag with Los Blancos but, crucially, he is the only centre-forward at Zidane’s disposal not called Karim Benzema.
West Ham and Leicester were planning to offer Jovic an escape route in January (Mirror, 1 November, page 61).
Given Madrid’s stance, this feels like a deal that should be placed on the backburner until the summer instead.
Zidane was more than a little coy when asked about Jovic’s future but, reading between the lines, the three-time Champions League winning coach suggested that the striker was not going to awaken from his Madrid nightmare until 2020/21 comes to an end.
“At the moment we do not contemplate any exit, but until January anything can happen,” Zidane said.
Jovic has played just 210 minutes of football this season, failing to score.
In total, a striker signed for nearly £60 million has found the net just twice in 37 matches in that famous Real shirt.
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