Inter transfer market: all the nodes of the Koulibaly deal

He had been proposed to Inter in the last hours of the winter transfer market, the Nerazzurri put him on stand-by and are now attacking. But to get to Chelsea-owned defender Kalidou Koulibaly, the road is winding and not downhill. Because K2, the new possible mountain of Inter’s defense after Milan Skriniar, is still a “heavy” player to move due to what had been the investment of the Blues, for his engagement and because the negotiation for the defender is part of discussions wider on the Milan-London axis.

TUCHEL FACTOR

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Just 12 months ago, Koulibaly moved to London for an amount close to 40 million euros and signed a contract worth 10 million a season. Many things have changed, starting with the farewell of Thomas Tuchel, the coach who had wanted the Senegalese to join the Blues and who now, who knows, could be the starting point for the player’s possible move to Bayern Munich, in what is currently only a ‘idea. While Inter and Chelsea are already talking to each other and did it face to face on the occasion of Piero Ausilio’s trip to England.

IN JANUARY

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Love did not break out between Koulibaly and Chelsea. So much so that already in January, with Tuchel who had separated from the Blues, the Kalidou-Inter idea was born. The Nerazzurri were now resigned to losing Skriniar and a transfer of the Slovakian to PSG already in the winter could not be ruled out, a hypothesis that would have allowed the Nerazzurri to at least earn a small nest egg and not lose one of the most valuable players in the squad. In those last hectic market days, with the casting for Skriniar’s possible replacement alive, Koulibaly was reported in Viale della Liberazione. But the hypothesis immediately died down precisely due to the pharaonic engagement of the defender. And Inter kept Skriniar, who then in fact never played again.

INTER’S PRESSING

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Now the nerazzurri have time to make no mistake about the purchase of a fundamental pawn in Simone Inzaghi’s starting eleven, net of Matteo Darmian’s excellent performance as a right defender in the three-man rearguard. Everyone at Inter likes Koulibaly, he’s a high-level profile that can be considered as leaving the club he belongs to. But in addition to the salary, there is the problem of the formula: the Nerazzurri would like to take out a loan deal like for Lukaku, but at the same time they have to register Chelsea’s pressure for Onana, a player that Inzaghi would like to keep, however. Difficult, at the moment, to get what you want without a sacrifice. But in the meantime Inter have thrown off the mask and are working to bring Koulibaly to San Siro, the stadium where he was the victim of racist insults from the Nerazzurri fans in December 2018 on the occasion of a Christmas Inter-Naples match decided by Lautaro Martinez in the final. Now in Milan they would welcome him with open arms, but the negotiation is not simple.