Real Madrid News
Aston Villa preparing €15 million offer for Real Madrid midfielder
The final days of the 2022/23 season were hectic for Real Madrid. The team had a long list of players in the final year of their contracts, and the management had to take a firm decision on their futures.
Karim Benzema and Marco Asensio headline the set of players who chose to change loyalties in the summer. Dani Ceballos was close to joining the duo on the way out but opted to renew in the nth minute.
But, according to reports from SPORT, Ceballos could leave Real Madrid less than two months after renewing his deal as Aston Villa are heavily interested in the midfielder and are even preparing an offer worth €15 million for his services.
The Emery-Ceballos connection
Unai Emery is the man at the helm for the Premier League side. The Spanish tactician hopes to make the Real Madrid star the heart of his project at Aston Villa and is personally pushing to sign him.
Emery and Ceballos have worked together in the past during their stints at Arsenal. Their run together lasted 17 games, as an injury to the midfielder and a poor set of results for Emery subsequently saw them separated.
The manager is aware of the stiff competition in Real Madrid’s midfield and hopes to use it to lure Ceballos away from the club of his dreams. In fact, this is not the first time Villa are enquiring about the player.
The Spanish midfielder is behind Eduardo Camavinga, Toni Kroos, Luka Modric, Jude Bellingham, Federico Valverde, and possibly Arda Guler for a starting spot.
Heading into the new season, it will take something special for him to push his way into the limelight in Madrid.
Where is Ceballos?
While Real Madrid are preparing to play their final game of the pre-season tour in the USA later today, Ceballos is notably not with the team.
He has stayed back in Spain and is recuperating from an injury to the distal tendon of the biceps femoris muscle of his right leg and is expected to miss the first part of the La Liga season.
The player’s new deal with Los Blancos runs until the summer of 2027. While the club does value his dedication to the badge immensely, they may not see a sale with bad eyes.
Life at Real Madrid has gotten off to a rather torrid start for Turkish starlet Arda Guler, who has already faced a large number of setbacks since singing for Los Blancos.
Aged just 18, the winger-slash-midfielder has already picked up seven injuries in his senior career, which is cause for serious concern, especially since a couple of them have affected his ligaments – which is always bad news.
Hotly-tipped to be an exciting addition to the Madrid squad going forward, the youngster had to drop out of their pre-season tour early due to a meniscus injury.
This was treated conservatively, but after that did not yield good results, he had to undergo a procedure and seemed set to make the squad against Las Palmas, before another injury setback.
According to Diario AS, the new problem can keep him out for three weeks to a month, which means his Real Madrid debut may have to wait till early November, after the first El Clasico of the season on 28th October.
Guler’s history of fitness problems
In their report, AS also state that the Turkish teenager seems to have a propensity for injuries, accumulating seven of them in his career already.
There is also word going around that his recovery from this meniscus issue was rushed and not handled adequately.
That, combined with a stroke of bad luck means Real Madrid have to be very mindful of how Guler is reintegrated into the squad going forward.
This new injury is reportedly a thigh problem which will also need to be treated with caution.
A special recovery plan
Carlo Ancelotti stated before and after the Las Palmas clash that the plan was for Guler to have some minutes against the Canary Islanders, but he said that genetics, luck and a lack of sharpness have a big part to play in this relapse.
The Italian manager did say that this issue is not as serious, but all signs indicate that there is an urgent need to work on the youngster’s conditioning.
AS thus say that a specific plan has been devised since the summer to enhance Guler’s fitness and his resistance.
This is a programme that is reportedly similar to the one Rodrygo followed when he arrived from Brazil, much thinner than he is today, but without having sacrificed his football qualities.
