Napoli Miss Out on Gabriel Jesus, Primed to Stand Pat | OneFootball

Napoli have been earmarking and tracking strikers throughout the summer, but their window will end with a whimper. They had gotten close to Gabriel Jesus and Marc Guiu, but they’ll head elsewhere because the Azzurri were unable to offload Lorenzo Lucca and Noa Lang, Il Mattino reports (via Tuttomercatoweb).

The Brazilian forward will move to Barcelona for €15M. Instead, the Chelsea outcast will transfer to RB Leipzig for about €20M. The Partenopei won’t acquire Ezequiel Zeballos either, despite blocking him about a month ago. They don’t have room on their lists, and he won’t wait until January, when he would have been able to join them for free at the end of his contract. Monza will purchase him for €4.5M with a 40 percent sell-on clause.

Napoli coach Allegri is said to be fine with the outcome and fielded both Lucca and Lang in the early going. The club shopped them around but didn’t want a €65M investment to go to waste.

The speedster has been close to Ajax and Galatasaray, but the latter landed Rafael Leao, while the Dutch side didn’t reach the €25M threshold with their offer. Instead, the Italian marksman hasn’t been part of the domino in his role position in Serie A.

Our Take on Napoli, Lucca, and Lang

Despite all the chatter and the supposed offers, this was always the most likely scenario. Their president demanded to be more judicious and less extemporaneous than under Antonio Conte, so they can go back to being financially virtuous. They didn’t perform well enough last season to fetch big bids. Still, they are no slouches, and Allegri is more malleable and forgiving, so they’ll come in handy occasionally.