It’s was always reported that it was going to take £80m to secure the services of Gonzalo Higuain from Napoli and Juventus have been the team to bust the bank after capturing his services for a fee of £75.3m – an Italian transfer record and the third highest of all time with only the signings by Real Madrid of Cristiano Ronaldo and Gareth Bale being worth more.
The 28 year old has spent 3 season’s in Naples and last year scored a phenomenal 36 goals in 35 Serie A appearances with goalscoring statistics like that it was only going to be a matter of time before a host of top European clubs came knocking.
The transfer was agreed after Juventus met the buyout clause required to purchase the Argentina international. Are they perhaps spending the Paul Pogba money before they have arrived and this a transfer fee that will somewhat appease the passionate Juventus fans who will obviously not be too pleased to see Pogba depart should that move finally go through.
If it doesn’t then it meant that Juventus has spent big this Summer but for a player of Higuain’s calibre and what he can provide it will probably be worth Euro as the capture of arguably the best Serie A player certainly outside of Juventus has just made the strongest side even stronger.
There was already criticism that Serie A like Ligue 1 was becoming a one team league and although it isn’t as bad in Italy as it is in France this transfer surely made someone else capturing the Scudetto next season all but an impossibility. I mean you only had to look at Juventus last season, they may have given their rivals a head start but once they found their momentum then they surged to the top of the table and from they never looked back. They have already won 5 titles in a row you certainly wouldn’t bet against it being number 6 come May.