CARLOS TEVEZ has decided that it will be the “best solution” to leave Manchester United after reluctantly accepting that Alex Ferguson wants to persist with Dimitar Berbatov and Wayne Rooney as his preferred strike partnership. Tevez, who started on the bench against Portsmouth last night, has attracted offers from Real Madrid and Internazionale but the Argentina forward also said he would consider signing for another English club.
“I need a regular place in the team to offer my best level and if that cannot happen at Manchester (United) I believe it will be my last year (at the club),” he said. “Out of respect to the fans and the history of Manchester United I do not want to leave the club in a bad way. But in my situation an exit will be the best solution.
“I have many offers already and not only from Spain. I have to see which club I can go to. It’s not only Real Madrid and Inter who want me and I need to study the options now, not just from a money point of view, but also because I want to play for a team with a good project and in a country that is perfect for my family. In particular, I want somewhere where my daughter is comfortable.”
Increasingly marginalised since Berbatov’s €34.2 million transfer from Tottenham Hotspur last September, Tevez went on to admit being frustrated by the manner in which he had been left out of United’s bigger games. The partnership between Rooney and Berbatov has failed to ignite, the two players combining directly for only one goal all season, but it has become clear to Tevez that he is increasingly seen by Ferguson as the odd man out.
“What I’ve found in England is that a player can score three or four goals in one match (Tevez got four in the League Cup tie against Blackburn Rovers on December 3rd) and in the following match not even make the team,” he said. “United have a lot of very good footballers but the fact is that I need to play more minutes.”
The former West Ham United player has managed to score 13 times this season and his popularity among the United supporters can be gauged by the crowd’s persistent chanting at recent games of “sign him up”. The signals, however, from Old Trafford have led Tevez to suspect United are unwilling to pay the €24.5 million that would be required to make him their player at the end of the season.
David Gill, the United chief executive, had said that the club would finalise the deal before Christmas, but that has been put back several times and the club’s official stance now is that they will not decide what to do until the summer.
The problem is understood to be finance-related but Tevez, whose priority is to play more first-team games, is giving serious consideration to leaving even if United do decide to complete the next stage of the business deal they arranged with the player’s adviser, Kia Joorabchian, in the summer of 2006.
Under the complicated terms of the agreement, United paid Joorabchian’s company €5.56 million for each of Tevez’s first two seasons on “loan” and, if they wanted to make a permanent deal, they would have to increase that to a total outlay of €35.6 million.
Ferguson, having insisted earlier in the season that the deal would happen, is now refusing to take questions on the matter.
That has left Tevez in a state of limbo and increasingly outspoken about his sense of injustice. Speaking to Radio Del Plata, an Argentinian station, he questioned whether Ferguson was right to leave him out so often.
“My job is to train every day and accept the orders of the manager. But the truth is there are options for next season. I do not understand my absence in so many decisive matches,” he said.
- Guardian Service
