Luigi Liguori, one of the youth players given a hugely-inflated transfer value as part of the Victor Osimhen deal between Napoli and LOSC, confirms he has ‘never even been to Lille. We felt really angry, they ruined our careers.’
The transfer is at the centre of an investigation into plusvalenze – inflated transfer valuations given to players in an exchange between clubs – which has become a more expanded look at creative accounting in football in general.
Osimhen was officially sold to Napoli in 2020 for €70m plus over €10m in bonuses, but €20m of that was made up of four players.
These were veteran goalkeeper Orestis Karnezis and three youth team players, Luigi Liguori, Claudio Manzi and Ciro Palmieri.
Repubblica newspaper tracked down Liguori, who is now playing in the Eccellenza amateur division, to ask just how realistic his transfer valuation was.
“I was on loan at Fermana in Serie C. In June, Napoli called and offered us two options: sign a one-year extension and stay or sign a three-year contract with Lille as part of the Osimhen transfer. What would you have done? We signed for Lille.
“However, I’ve never even been to Lille, we signed the contracts there and were left on loan in Italy. On July 1 this year, Lille sent a message that we should all go to France, but we didn’t want to, so we accepted the early termination.
“Unfortunately, we didn’t know what was going on at the time, it was only a few weeks later that we uncovered it all.”
Rather than be a boost to their careers, Liguori insists being involved in this financial game behind the scenes ruined their opportunities.
“I was valued at €4m in the transfer. This weighed heavily on my career and it really made me angry. We discovered it was not a transfer for us, it was all for someone else.
“I still keep in contact with the other two lads involved in the transfer and we say to each other, we had a three-year contract. Our careers were ‘ruined’ because of Napoli, because we didn’t know anything about it.”
It was clear from the first minute that something was very wrong with this transfer. Denying it is an insult to people’s intelligence. ADL was stupid for repeating the numbers of that transfer publicly and keep insisting on it. Maybe he thought no one will ever bother to investigate.
If they don’t prosecute Napoli for this, then I doubt anything will come out of this investigation all together.
Can only imagine if this was Juventus. They would be piling all over it.
Juventus are also being investigating LOL duh
“we should all go to France, but we didn’t want to, so we accepted the early termination.”
I’m sorry, who ruined your career? Why not see out the contract?
Wait, so Lille actually wanna use him but he chose to play in Serie C instead? Why?
No surprise they did not want to go to france. why would they? i only go when i am forced to. never voluntarily.
@Luigi That part stood out to me as well. Why did he accept to sign for Lille and then refuse to go to France when they wanted him to come over? If he didn’t want to play outside of Italy he shouldn’t have signed for Lille, and instead done the 1 year extension Napoli were offering. Not sure how this isn’t entirely his fault.
He refuse come back to france and accept early termination then he blame someone else for the downfall of his career lmao.