There has been quite a bit of speculation surrounding Luka Modrić’s possible transfer to Inter Milan. But will the best player of the World Cup leave Real Madrid, the club that has given him four Champions League titles?
August 9, 2018 - On Wednesday, international media reported that Luka Modrić returned to Madrid for training after an extended World Cup break. Italian media claimed, however, that Modrić left the first training session early to negotiate with Real Madrid President Florentino Perez about his possible transfer to Inter Milan.
Real Madrid resolutely denied the claims that Modrić left training early to negotiate Inter's interest.
"Not only did he not leave training an hour earlier, but he left the training two hours after everyone else. Luka is always a player who, together with captain Sergio Ramos, spends most of his time at training sessions. On Wednesday, he came to our Valdebebas Sports Center at 9:20 am and departed from there at about 2:30 pm,” Real Madrid's spokesperson said to Hina.
This directly refers to the news an Italian journalist posted via Twitter, which reportedly showed Modrić leaving training early.
"That is an absolute lie and the stupidity that comes from Italy," the spokesperson added.
President Perez and General Director José Ángel Sánchez returned to Madrid at around 2:30 pm from the American tour yesterday and apparently had no plans to meet with Modrić then anyhow.
"Luka Modrić, the Golden Ball winner of the World Cup, started preparations and trained at the club center, where he joined Marcelo, Varane, Casemiro, and Kovačić, who had a special training session at the gym,” said Real Madrid on their website.
“After the initial warm-up, the players did different exercises combining skills, touch and running with the ball before ending with a match on a small field. Modrić, on the other hand, finished the session with some jogging,” added the European Champion.
The training was closed to the media and Real Madrid released photos and video clips on their website where Modrić is seen training. Real Madrid has repeated that the 32-year-old midfielder has a contract until 2020 and they have no intention of selling him in the event a bid is received.
However, whatever meeting Modrić plans to have with Pérez will still happen, and it is believed to be held later this week - perhaps Friday or Saturday.
It is expected that Modrić and his team, including managers Lemić, Mijatović and Riso, will face Perez in Madrid to tell him what is already known: the Real Madrid playmaker is considering leaving his club of six years because he is looking forward to new challenges, and Inter is offering him a much better salary than what he currently has. This refers to the agreement Modrić has with the president and on the basis of which Ronaldo went to Juventus. According to this agreement, Modrić can leave the club if he gets a satisfactory offer, and Inter’s is more than good.
Inter has offered Modrić a four-year, 10 million euro contract per season. In addition, they also offered him a two-year contract with Chinese club Jiangsu, which is owned by the Suning Holdings Group, the same company that owns Inter.
Morić would, therefore, earn 60 million euro in the next six years thanks to Inter, which is not too bad for someone who will be 33 in less than a month.
Inter would first loan Modrić for a year at 15 million euro, avoiding problems with financial fair play. Next summer, Inter would buy Luka's contract from Real for an additional 25 million euro.
Perez declared recently that the only way Modrić could leave Madrid would be if a club meets his 750 million euro release clause.
Will Luka really leave Madrid?
