A major update has emerged on Crystal Palace target Radu Dragusin regarding where he wants to play his football next season.
What's the talk?
The Eagles have been dealt a blow in their pursuit of the Juventus centre-back as his agent Florian Manea revealed that the 19-year-old wants to stay with the Italian giants.
Manea has confirmed that Dragusin wishes to remain at Juventus despite offers to join clubs in England and Germany, telling Calcio Mercato, as transcribed by JuveFC:
“He wants to stay at Juventus, he does not want to leave. There have been offers from England and Germany, but he wants to play for Juventus. If you do your best, I believe that in the end you will get to play for Juve.
“If Dragusin does leave, it will just be on loan to get more playing time. But he wants to remain a Juventus player."
Earlier this year, former Juventus head coach Andrea Pirlo called Dragusin an “interesting” player, telling Gazzetta dello Sport, as transcribed by TekDeeps: “Radu Dragusin did very well, he is a very interesting player who has been training with us for several months. He is a young man of perspective and has already demonstrated his qualities."
Fans will be gutted
Crystal Palace fans must be gutted reading these quotes from Manea as they seemingly rule out the chance of Dragusin ending up at Selhurst Park this summer.
The teenager is desperate to stay at Juventus and there does not appear to be an opening to sign him permanently in the coming months, which could rule Palace out of the race for his services and provide a major blow to Steve Parish's plans in the short and long-term for the club. Fans will surely be frustrated that they now look set to miss out on the young prospect following this update.
Whilst Manea has opened the door to a loan deal for Dragusin if Juventus have no plans to play him next season, Palace may not be able to provide him with regular game-time. At the age of 19, the Romanian is a prospect rather than an established player, and there is no way for Palace to guarantee that he will be able to start every week with the centre-back options they have at their disposal. Mamadou Sakho, James Tomkins, Martin Kelly, Chiekhou Kouyate, Gary Cahill and Scott Dann are already at the club, which could limit how much Dragusin is able to play next season if he joins the Eagles.
This would not be an issue with a permanent deal for the 1.91m (6 foot 3) beast, though. All of the aforementioned centre-back options for Palace are 31 or older and heading into the final years of their careers, whilst Dragusin is in the embryonic stages of his.
Therefore, he could be the long-term solution to Palace's centre-back problems and has the potential to be a key player for years to come, even if it does not happen immediately. That is why a short-term loan deal would not make sense for Palace and why this news is a major blow to Parish's pursuit of the defender.
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