news-engine

Pedro Neto started and played 75 minutes in yesterday’s 3-1 friendly win over Real Sociedad, but the 26-year-old winger’s future at Chelsea may not be fully assured. Al-Hilal also linked with Pedro Neto — reports /shocked-face He had been rumored to be of interest for Enzo Maresca at Manchester City over the past few weeks — though not seriously enough for us to set any sort of public deadline, like in the case of Enzo Fernández — and more recently, Al-Hilal from the Saudi Pro League have also been linked. In fact, some reports have gone so far as to claim that Neto has agreed personal terms with the SPL side, though the price quoted in those rumors, €60m (£50m), is well below our supposed asking price, £70m that was reported earlier. In fairness, that valuation was proving a “significant gap” away from what Man City were supposedly willing to pay as well, so we might need to relax our demands if we want to business. That said, I don’t think we’re in any rush to let go of Neto, who has been a key player for us ever since joining from Wolves two years ago, making over 100 appearances and scoring 19 goals with 19 assists as well. His statistical output may not be amazing, but he’s a bit of an energizer bunny plus he makes funny faces. Nothing’s ever as dramatic as anything that happens to Neto. And though he may be looking at a reduced role under Xabi Alonso, that’s just conjecture at the moment (Alonso has only had a week to work with the full squad at this point).