Real Madrid give James Rodríguez and Napoli 10 days
According to La Repubblica, Florentino Pérez and Aurelio De Laurentiis have agreed a deal for the midfielder if no offers arrive before 15 August.
With Atlético Madrid out of the running for James Rodríguez, Napoli now have a clear run at securing the services of the Real Madrid and Colombia midfielder, a deal that is inching closer after Florentino Pérez and his counterpart Aurelio De Laurentiis reached a verbal agreement that if no suitable offer for the 28-year-old arrives before 15 August he will be allowed to join the Serie A side on loan.
Real are holding out for a permanent transfer in the region of 40 million euros for James but as yet no club has made an offer including a cash sum for the midfielder, who is not a favourite of Zinedine Zidane and spent the last two seasons on loan at Bayern Munich. The Bundesliga champions elected not to make the move permanent despite having a €42m purchase option on James and the player has returned to the fold at Valdebebas. How long he will remain there is a question that Carlo Ancelotti and De Laurentiis are eager to find the answer to, the Serie A side having made the Colombian a priority target this summer.
James forced to play waiting game as Pérez holds out for a fee
Although Napoli are in negotiations over a 40m move for PSV winger Hirving Lozano, should James become available on their terms they will snap up the Real midfielder on a one-year loan deal with an option to but next summer.
Real’s conditions are quite straightforward: if a cash offer comes in for James it will be accepted, but if by 15 August there is nothing on the table Pérez will sanction the loan move to get the player off the Bernabéu’s books and free up some space in Zidane’s bloated squad.
Italian daily La Repubblica reports that the agreement between Pérez and De Laurentiis is in place but James will have to wait a week and a half to discover what next season holds despite Real’s pre-season woes and Marco Asensio’s injury.