Rui Costa faced huge hurdles in Benfica’s transfer market | OneFootball

So far, Benfica has had one of the most productive transfer markets in its history, with the arrival of some heavyweights such as Richard Ríos, Georgiy Sudakov or Dodi Lukebakio. However, not everything went well for Rui Costa and the reds during this off-season, with some moves, like João Félix's, falling through.

The newspaper A Bola reports in its Friday, September 5 edition, that in addition to the completed deals, there were targets that slipped through the eagles' fingers. The first name to leave Rui Costa 'high and dry' was Nélson Semedo, with the 31-year-old right-back preferring to head to Fenerbahçe, rather than returning to Luz.

João Félix. Amid several advances and setbacks, everything pointed to the deal being close to closing, until Al Nassr of Cristiano Ronaldo and Jorge Jesus took the forward to Saudi Arabia.

However, the 'failures' did not stop there. Before Sudakov, the eagles also tried to sign Thiago Almada, who ended up signing for Atlético Madrid. The overlooked target for that same position was Mohamed Amoura, but even with the eagles willing to break all transfer records, the Algerian ended up staying at Wolfsburg.

Last but not least, the signing of a right winger was seen as a priority throughout the market, but only materialized on deadline day, with the arrival of the Belgian international. Until then, Rui Costa did everything to secure the arrival of Anis Hadj-Moussa, from Feyenoord, or Carlos Álvarez, a youngster from Levante, but none of the deals materialized.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.