Luciano Spalletti wants Leandro Paredes to “stay at Roma” but “sometimes you can use strong players to fund the transfer market”.
The midfielder has been linked with Leicester City, having impressed while on loan at Empoli last season.
“Every now and then you [the media] put things in my mouth that didn’t come from me,” Spalletti said after today’s friendly win over Fondi.
Luciano Spalletti wants Leandro Paredes to “stay at Roma” but “sometimes you can use strong players to fund the transfer market”.
The midfielder has been linked with Leicester City, having impressed while on loan at Empoli last season.
“Every now and then you [the media] put things in my mouth that didn’t come from me,” Spalletti said after today’s friendly win over Fondi.
“Paredes is a strong player in our opinion, and we want to use him, but sometimes in a transfer market like this you can use strong players to fund the transfer market, so that affects everyone.
“It’s like that for Napoli too, who wanted to keep [Gonzalo] Higuain [who went to Juventus].
“For that reason we can’t say what our thinking is absolutely, because there are so many things to be taken into account and that doesn’t just apply to Paredes.
“For me he’s a good player and he’ll stay at Roma.”
Willian Vainqueur played a full 90 minutes in the 4-0 win today, but Spalletti isn’t able to guarantee him a starting shirt for the coming season.
“We appreciate him for his quality, but we also have to make choices and we have others. We need to see if he has the motivation to stay, because he has to earn his place.
“At a time when a player hasn’t played much for a year, it’s clear that he’s fired up and reaching for a starting shirt.
“He hasn’t played much and it’s not easy for us to promise that he’ll be included, so he could make different choices because a player of his age wants to play.
“The evaluation is how available a starting spot will be, because I can’t promise that given we have Paredes and [Daniele] De Rossi in that role.
“He has to keep doing what he’s doing and he has to improve in terms of moving the ball a bit faster, and in terms of the intuition about the quality of his passes when we have the ball, the speed of the play.
“If he does that then he’ll definitely be stronger.”