Before the start of the new season of the Russian Premier League (RPL) ) Moscow «Spartak» expected to seriously increase, but did not wait for the necessary reinforcements. Somewhere — because of their own naivety, as in the case of the Serbian defender Strahinj Erakovic and his connection with the St. Petersburg «Zenith», somewhere — through the fault of third parties.
One of the main deals of the summer in the RPL was to be the transfer of Colombian defender Davinson Sanchez from Tottenham to Spartak. As expected, it was not without difficulties in negotiations with the English club: it is difficult for absolutely everyone to deal with Spurs boss Daniel Levy. , but the result was still sad. Apparently, there will be no Davinson Sanchez in Spartak. And this time, Levy's greed has nothing to do with the broken negotiations.
According to The Guardian, Sanchez's transfer was opposed by the English Premier League (EPL). According to the British media, the Premier League leadership expressed its intention to «in every possible way prevent clubs from doing business with Russian colleagues.» How exactly the league is legally able to ban the sale of players to Russia, no one knows.
However, the British tactfully refer to some possible risks in potential deals and remind that some clubs are under sanctions. Spartak is not one of them, but the Premier League does not seem to care about this fact. Ethics is called the key aspect of this situation in England — they say, in these times it is immoral to rake Russian money with a shovel.
For the same reason, the transfer of Brazilian defender Rogerio from the Italian Sassuolo failed earlier at Spartak. The situation is almost identical: the parties reached all the agreements, but at the last moment the director of the non-verdi, Giovanni Carnevali, took the floor.
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«Negotiations were led by the player's agent, we received a very serious offer. After thinking it over, they decided to refuse «Spartacus» for ethical reasons. We don't want to deal with the Russians. You can't do business with this country. And yes, even at the cost of losing a football player for free,” he said.
The behavior of a successful businessman, no less. True, it has nothing to do with ethics.
For some reason, the boss of Sassuolo suddenly forgot that since 2002 the owner and main sponsor of the club has been the Mapei company, which continues to this day a major activity in Russia. This behavior of the Italians looks especially ridiculous against the background of the work of other Serie A clubs, which willingly acquire players from the RPL. Including Russian ones. For some reason, Lazio does not believe that the purchase of Arsen Zakharyan from Dynamo Moscow does not meet ethical considerations.
The same applies to the Premier League. The league manages to prevent clubs from selling players in the RPL, but it doesn’t do the same with a repurchase. Even if we take into account the fact that FIFA allowed the players of Russian clubs to unilaterally suspend contracts, for some reason it seems very ethical for the Premier League to acquire the assets of RPL teams.
From the outside, this looks like hypocrisy and idiocy, although one thing is not excludes the other. Let's add the fact that English clubs are also in no hurry to pay for transfers issued before February 2022. Even if there are relevant requirements from FIFA. So who then discredits sports and gentlemen's principles?
The opinion of the author may not coincide with the position of the editors.