It sometime happens to a player who has a reason to believe that he is not being taken seriously by his manager especially after his impressive performance in the league. We are talking about 27-year-old Roma defender Mehdi Benatia who enthralled everyone with his improved show in just concluded Italian Serie A. In fact, like always, after the league, he seemed to be roared in by the top sides eyeing for the brightest talents around the world and English and Spanish clubs are on top when it comes to snatch good players from the rivals. Another problem Benatia is passing through is unfair treatment from his manager and coach which came into the notice when he accused the team think-tank of treating him like a child. He talked about how he is being disrespected from the team in an interview where he pointed out how his agent had advised him not to sign a deal with Roma, still he signed the five-year contract and in the first year of stay in Italy, he came to know why he should have not done the deal. He also pointed out Roma’s promise to offer him a lucrative offer should they perform well in the scudetto or in The Championship league, but again, they made him sign rather an unacceptable offer.
Notably, he shifted from Udinese to Giallorossi on a five year contract and as per the current news coming from the England and Spain, both Barcelona and Manchester City seem to be interested in the Morocco international which made Roma director of football Walter Sabatini put a hefty 61 million euros price tag to encash his demand among the leading sides. In his media byte, though, he refused to accept that they want him to switch and said, “Mehdi is a great player with a contract that expires in four years’ time. We have no problem with him. He’s a guy with sound principles and that’s precisely what helped him have such an excellent season last term.
“Perhaps he slipped up with a few comments or words but he didn’t intend to distance himself from Roma or the fans. I know him very well. He mentioned broken promises. That’s not exactly how it went. It’s true that when he signed for Roma he turned down other offers that were higher than ours.”
Explaining Roma’s back stand from the initial promises, he added, “We offered him an increase — although there was no obligation for us to do so — and we didn’t agree on the amount, but he didn’t mean to describe it as ‘ridiculous.’ He’s speaking a language that’s not his own — you can’t slaughter him for it.”
Don’t know who is right in this case, but anyway, it would now be interesting to see how Roma keep its in-form player after being caught by the radar of dominating clubs!