Napoli president makes joke about Man Utd interest in duo

Ross Gibson

Napoli President Aurelio De Laurentiis provided an update on the futures of Manchester United linked Dries Mertens and Jorginho on Thursday.

De Laurentiis also spoke of the future of Callejon, who is a Manchester City target – and Maurizio Sarri, who has been linked with replacing Antonio Conte at Chelsea.

“I chose Sarri when nobody believed in him,” De Laurentiis said.

“We have an appointment for next week. We will meet and talk about the future. I am optimist, I hope he will be with us next season but I can’t force him to stay. I don’t think he can complain about his time at Napoli.

“We didn’t win many titles also in the previous campaigns. But we were spending less than now.

 

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“Currently there are many rumours about Jorginho, Callejon, Mertens and Hamsik. Our project will continue. Maybe we will cash in €1 billion (he laughs).

“This year we did not manage to win. We had to play the Champions League play-offs at the beginning of the season and we are tired now. Maybe somebody didn’t allow us to win the league. Somebody took us eight points. Somebody belonging to the organization that did not use the VAR properly.

“The behaviour of referees was strange. Did they damage us? You can say it, Italy has many problems and silence is one of them.”