Fiorentina’s biggest narrative of the summer somehow hasn’t been the shock resignation of Raffaele Palladino a day after the Viola brass praised him in its end-of-season press conference. No, that honor belongs to Moise Kean, and in particular, the €52 million option that was in his contract from 1-15 July. I say was because, with midnight come and gone, that clause is dead, dead, dead.
€52 million was a tantalizingly low sum for Italy’s most explosive striker and generated a howling tempest of so-called
journalism around Kean: Manchester United, Bayern Munich, Barcelona, Real Madrid, and a host of others were “keeping tabs” on Kean or “monitoring” him or “maintaining interest” or doing whatever it is that big clubs tell the lowest, most irritating kind of scoopster they’re doing for pretty much any competent player.
In the end, though, it all amounted to a dry fart. Kean flatly rejected the tentative approaches of a couple of Saudi clubs and otherwise kept his head down. That low profile was a pretty clear indication that he didn’t want to move this summer and when he showed up for preseason training on Monday, his words and actions reinforced that intention.
For its part, Fiorentina has already assembled a new contract for its superstar striker that will pay him €4.5 million annually until 2030; talks are expected to begin this week but Daniele Pradè’s probably already been in touch with Kean’s agent Alessandro Lucci and that a signature will be forthcoming directly. I haven’t heard anything about buyout clauses but, given the furor this one caused, I assume they’re conspicuously absent.
Let’s not get too excited, though. This is the modern game we’re talking about and players rarely reach the end of their contracts if they perform at a high level. If I were a betting man (I’m not, and you shouldn’t be either), I’d put money on the Moose leaving Florence before 2030. I also wouldn’t be surprised if there was a handshake deal in place between his camp and Pradè to let him leave early if a desirable suitor comes calling, sort of like what happened with Nikola Milenković last summer.
For now, though, this is the right call for everyone. New manager Stefano Pioli gets Serie A’s most charismatic striker and Kean gets to be the centerpiece on a European contender in a World Cup year, which should allow him to hang onto his starting job for the Azzurri (although Gianluca Scamacca and Lorenzo Lucca will pile on the pressure), especially since Mateo Retegui’s taken himself out of the running. Everyone wins.
The biggest winner of all, though, might be Fiorentina’s management. Pioli now knows who to build his team around, ensuring that the team is on the same page in preseason. And that team is much closer to complete than it’s been at this point in recent memory: I expect to see another midfielder or two brought in and maybe another attacker, but the rest of the squad is locked in, especially once Rolando Mandragora and Dodô sign new deals. My read on the situation is that Pradè got to work early in the transfer window, bringing in quality reinforcements to convince Kean that this is a project worth sticking with.
In short, there’s a lot of positive energy around Fiorentina right now, which is a strange state of affairs for fans. We’re used to being equal parts cautious, horrified, and bombastically optimistic in mid-July, mostly because the club’s already sold or is about to sell at least one of its most important players. This year, though, it looks like everyone we want to stay is going to stay, and Pradè can now do his usual lurking act to snap up quality reinforcements later in the window without compromising the squad’s development during preseason.
And somehow, that’s even worse. My Viola-pilled brain can’t accept this level of positivity and is working overtime to construct doomsday scenarios. Yours probably is too. But at least those scenarios don’t currently involve someone swooping in for Kean at the last moment. He’ll be here, and that’s worth way more than €52 million.
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