Atletico Madrid bite back with scathing statement after Real Madrid’s club-record bid for Julian Alvarez rejected

Atletico Madrid have slammed Real Madrid shortly after turning down a club-record offer of €150million for their striker Julian Alvarez.

The bid came after Real Madrid president Florentino Perez promised to place an imminent offer for a ‘Galactico’ type player.

Getty

Perez, who was re-elected as Real Madrid club president on Sunday, last week revealed that he would table a bid of €150m (£130m) for the undisclosed star.

He even told fans and reporters that he would place the bid on Tuesday – something he has now carried out. 

He said: “Next Tuesday I will make a bid of 150 million euros for a player who is not from the Premier League and it’s not [Michael] Olise.

“It will be the biggest bid in Madrid’s history.”

Despite the mammoth size of Real’s offer, it falls nowhere near the Argentine’s release fee which stands at a whopping €500m.

A statement from the 15-time European Cup winners read: “Real Madrid C. F. announces that, following the meeting of the Board of Directors held today, it has made an offer of 150 million euros to Club Atlético de Madrid for the federative rights of the player Julián Álvarez.

“After reviewing and evaluating the offer, Club Atlético de Madrid has expressed its gratitude for the proposal, made within the framework of the good relations between both clubs, and has rejected it, referring to the player’s release clause.”

Following Real’s statement on Tuesday evening, Atletico Madrid produced a scathing one of their own.

The post, published across Atletico’s social media platforms, took aim at Real, referring to them as laughable while confirming that they will not consider the offer under any circumstances.

It read: “Official statement with our clarifications regarding the official statement from our neighbours.

Getty

“Real Madrid. 1. They cut out the part of the Pope’s video where he said he was an Atleti fan too. 2. You must have confused education with gratitude, but to leave no doubt: we don’t thank you for anything.

“3. We neither study nor consider any offer for Julián. 4. How could we not get along, when you make us laugh even more than Barcelona does.”

They also hit out at their neighbour’s alleged attempts to cherry pick Atleti’s pool of talented youngsters.

An additional post read: “P.S. Taking advantage of the good relationship with your new president, let’s see if you stop “stealing” players from our Academy. Thanks a lot, Real Madrid.”

Speculation has been rife over the past week on who Perez was targeting as his marquee summer signing.

Initially, it was believed that he was targeting one of Paris Saint-Germain’s star trio of Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, Vitinha and Joao Neves.

Getty

Following PSG’s ‘not for sale’ stance, attention quickly turned to Bayern Munich ace Michael Olise.

The Bundesliga champions followed PSG’s lead and laughed off any attempts to prise away the French winger.

That left Alvarez as the most likely and realistic target with the World Cup winner keen to leave Atletico this summer.

Barcelona had been credited with an interest but their advances were publicly laughed off by Atleti in a series of comical social media posts.

Deals tied up

Perez has been active elsewhere as part of his presidential campaign by agreeing deals for Liverpool‘s Ibrahima Konate and Inter’s Denzel Dumfries.

Jose Mourinho is also set for a Bernabeu reunion after agreeing to take over at the club for the second time.

AFP

All three deals are expected to be tied up in the coming days.

Perez was successfully re-installed as president after polling 65 per cent of the vote against fellow candidate Enrique Riquelme.

The 79-year-old, who has been president for a total of 23 years across two separate spells, has seen his popularity drop in recent times.

Real Madrid’s failure to win a major trophy in the past two years has left fans disgruntled and they have left Perez know of their dissatisfaction on multiple occasions.

However, many believe Perez is still the man to turn around Madrid’s fortunes and he will be given the opportunity to steer the club back to the top of European football.

But he may need to look elsewhere for a world-class attacking reinforcement with Atleti likely to play hardball with their city rivals.

Atletico say they would like Alvarez to remain at the club despite his preference to leave.

Getty

Getty

Should he depart, the La Liga club prefer that Alvarez moves to a club outside of Spain to prevent a scenario where they would be actively strengthening a rival club.

But there is a huge stumbling block in that the Argentine does not want to leave Spain for family reasons.

PSG and Arsenal have been linked with the striker but appear unlikely to tempt him into a move.

That could leave Atletico in a difficult position alongside Real Madrid and Barcelona where they may have to choose the lesser of two evils in a transfer saga that could drag on throughout the summer.