Gossip: Veloso Talk Hardens
At first, it seemed like light-as-a-feather press speculation.
Now the rumours of Sporting Lisbon’s Miguel Veloso moving to Old Trafford have hardened, with talk emerging of the midfielder joining United next January.
The Telegraph devoted a full article to the chatter yesterday and revealed that the hype was not purely the result of the fevered imagination of either a sports hack or the midfielder’s agent - Veloso wants the move too.
Coach Carlos Queiroz admitted in the Mirror that United were trailing the midfielder. At the same time he gave advance notice of United’s other targets and probably increased their sale price too, in an an interview which bordered on ‘tapping up.’
“It is impossible to ignore good players and we are following the evolution of some top players,” said Queiroz. “One is Veloso. He would be hard to ignore.
“Big clubs such as Manchester United, Barcelona and Arsenal have a scouting system that looks at players throughout the year. Players like Miguel Veloso, Joao Moutinho, Ricardo Quaresma, Bosingwa or Bruno Alves are on the list.”
Meanwhile, tempers in Lisbon are becoming increasingly frayed as the club’s star employee moves towards the exit. United have a ’special relationship’ with Sporting Lisbon, having bought their two best players in the past four years but Queiroz’s newspaper interviews are putting that relationship under strain.
The Sun newspaper today claims Sporting president Filipe Soares Franco is livid and has accused the Old Trafford coach of ‘unacceptable’ behaviour by announcing United’s interest in the Portuguese international via the media.
Franco said: “I can’t help regretting Carlos Queiroz’s declarations about Manchester United’s interest in Veloso. It is necessary everyone realises Veloso is a Sporting player.
“He has a contract and he’s going to honour it. He will not be for sale in the January transfer window. He’ll only be sold when someone pays his £20m buy-out clause.
“Carlos Queiroz is an employee of Manchester United and made an unacceptable insinuation.”
United may find the money however, if one of the current players is sold.
“We have good midfield players like Scholes, Carrick, Hargreaves and Anderson,” Queiroz told Mirror readers. “But it is true that if someone was to leave the club then Veloso would be a priority.”
So, does that mean someone might be leaving the club CQ?
