Nigeria international striker Sadiq Umar will likely leave Almeria this summer with Villarreal close to agreeing a cash plus player bid for the 25 year old, OwnGoalNigeria.com can exclusively reveal.
After guiding Almeria to promotion to La Liga Sadiq who also finished as top scorer for the club for the second consecutive season is linked with a move away with interest from top teams around Europe.
Ajax, Benfica are among the two teams to have sounded out his representatives over his availability but it appears Villarreal are leading the race to sign him with meeting already held to that effect.
Villarreal were told it will cost €25 million plus other variables which will see the deal rise to around €30m. Half of what is contained in the buyout clause of the lanky Nigerian striker.
Almeria are willing to accept a price lower than Sadiq’s buy out clause as a mark of respect to the Nigerian, who decided against all odds to remain at the club last season despite offers to move to a La Liga side.
Talks were held between both teams with Almeria pushing for Villarreal to add Manu Morlanes who they had on loan two seasons ago as part of the deal. Villarreal are not opposed to the idea and they could also raise cash for other aspect of the deal with the impending sale of Arnold Danjuma.
However, their biggest obstacle will be convincing Sadiq who is keen on a move to Sevilla owing very much to his relationship with the sporting director of the team Monchi. They were both together at Roma.
We gathered Sadiq gave his words to Monchi after a failed bid to sign him last summer. He promised to prioritize a move to the Andalusian side ahead of any in this window. Sadiq also wants to play for a team in the UEFA Champions League.
The situation will be a lot clearer in the coming weeks when the forward returns to Spain for the start of pre season training. He is presently in his hometown state Kaduna and watched a recent Nigeria Professional Football League game between Niger Tornadoes and Kwara United at the Ahmadu Bello Stadium.
