Fiorentina put themselves into difficulty over Stevan Jovetic
It seems not too long ago that we were all discussing the prospect of a three pronged race to sign Montenegro’s most valued asset, Stevan Jovetic, with Arsenal, Juventus and Manchester City all being linked with the attacking midfielder come striker. However in the month that has followed this intense speculation it appears that none of the three aforementioned clubs are still interested in the forward with Fiorentina’s asking price of thirty million Euros having priced the player out of move away from the club. Juventus opted to spend significantly less money on Carlos Tevez whilst Arsenal look to have secured a slightly cheaper deal for Real Madrid’s Gonzalo Higuain which leaves just Manchester City who appear close to securing the signature of Spanish striker Alvaro Negredo from Sevilla.
It was said that the animosity between Fiorentina and Juventus was one of the reasons that the transfer failed to materialise and Juventus director Giuseppe Marotta this morning all but confirmed these reports when speaking at a press conference, “Jovetic? He was an option we went after during the summer, but due to difficult relations with Fiorentina I think at this point we are fine as we are.” It is believed that the Turin club were unwilling to try and negotiate a cheaper deal with relations as they are with the Florence club.
Whilst the three teams mentioned above having all moved on to alternative targets this does not mean that at least one of them won’t come back in for Stevan Jovetic however it will only come once Fiorentina reduce their asking price of thirty million Euros, and that looks highly unlikely at this stage. Fiorentina have as daft as it sounds put themselves into a bit of trouble by price Stevan Jovetic out of the market as the Florence club is now very close to securing an eighteen million Euros transfer for Bayern Munich hitman Mario Gomez with the funding for that transfer having been expected to come out of the profit made of Jovetic. Whilst Fiorentina are still in a position to pay for Gomez it was not at all in their plans to still have Jovetic as a player when they secure the signature of Gomez, this has been a sizeable miscalculation of the club’s part.
On the flip-side however it is relatively easy to illustrate how Mario Gomez and Stevan Jovetic could play together under Vincenzo Montella with the German being utilised as almost a target man who is given the task of holding up the ball, bringing the wider players into the attacking move before making a late run into the box himself. Jovetic would be deposited just behind Gomez in the ‘false nine’ role which has become oh so popular in recent years although it is yet to catch on as widely in Italy’s Serie A, Jovetic would use his quick, neat footwork to create space for himself and then look to play Mario Gomez into a scoring position with a clever reverse pass much like David Silva attempts to do with Edin Dzeko at Manchester City when the Bosnian is given game time.
This does not take into account one Giuseppe Rossi who is rapidly approaching full fitness after recovering from a longstanding anterior cruciate ligament injury sustained during his time with Villarreal. The Italian signed on with Fiorentina last January for around ten million Euros with the club even then preparing for the summer departure of Jovetic and it was hoped within the club that Rossi and Gomez would go onto forge a partnership where Rossi dropped ever so slightly behind Gomez not quite as an attacking midfield but a second striker feeding off the knockdowns provided by Gomez, Stevan Jovetic was not considered as part of Fiorentina when this plan was conjured up.
According to goal.com, football agent Eugenio Ascari has urged Stevan Jovetic to try and make peace with his current employers as quickly as possible, as it seems as if the Montenegrin forward will be spending another year in Serie A with the Viola, ” I see too many obstacles at this time to see Jovetic join Juve, so now if I were him I would try to fix the relationship with Fiorentina.” This is something that I feel may unattainable with the supporters of Fiorentina having already turned against Jovetic with the majority of their anger being vented towards Jovetic’s desire to leave a club he deems beneath him. Fiorentina supporters responded to this by producing a banner which stated that no single player was bigger than the club and any who thinks so should leave. This difficult situation created both by Jovetic’s open desire to leave the club and Fiorentina’s miscalculation on the Montenegrins’ price has led to a situation where the club needs to sell Jovetic and Jovetic needs to leave the club yet they are struggling to find a buyer.
Fiorentina amidst the controversy surrounding Stevan Jovetic’s protracted move away from Stadio Artemio Franchi have in the past forty eight hours stated that there had been an increased interest in Jovetic from a number of other clubs across Europe however I expect some embellishing of the facts has gone on in this statement with the likelihood being that if a club was seriously interested in Jovetic and was willing to pay a reasonable fee, they would be able to secure a deal for Jovetic quite quickly with all parties looking for the same outcome now.
We may well see Juventus or even Manchester City come back in for Jovetic with a mammoth offer we just can’t rule that out however, it is more than likely that we may not. Fiorentina wanted to assert themselves as the controllers of negotiations by putting such a high asking price upon the shoulders of Stevan Jovetic and it has now backfired on them with the club needing the get the player off the books in order to make room for new signings. Fiorentina’s stubbornness has put the club into a difficult position and it could well lead to them losing Jovetic for far less than what Arsenal, Juventus and Manchester City were original prepared to pay in the first instance.