Two made in Cotia out, one back: São Paulo seal loan, centre-back deal off | OneFootball

São Paulo continues to trim its squad for the rest of the season, negotiating the departures of some players who are not part of Dorival Júnior’s plans for the end of 2016.

As AVANTE MEU TRICOLOR reported earlier this week, Tricolor was already in advanced talks to loan out defensive midfielder Negrucci, 22, to Athletic, a club from Minas Gerais that plays in Brazil’s Série B, which was confirmed this Saturday (18), according to UOL.

The deal was agreed as a six-month loan, until the end of the season, with no purchase option included for the Cotia academy graduate, who is under contract with São Paulo until the end of 2030.

The move was backed by the Minas Gerais club’s head coach, Alex. The former midfielder worked directly with Negrucci during his time in charge of São Paulo’s under-20 team between 2021 and 2022, a period in which the midfielder solidified his development before being promoted to the senior squad at Morumbi.

AVAÍ TARGETS PAULINHO

Another academy player without space at Tricolor is 21-year-old forward Paulinho, who had already been allowed by the club to look for a team to join on loan this season.

Also according to UOL, Avaí are interested in the youngster and have opened talks with São Paulo to take the striker to Santa Catarina. For now, there have only been initial discussions between the clubs, with no official offer yet from the interested side.

Paulinho stood out in the under-20 team after Ryan Francisco’s promotion to the senior squad, but suffered an injury just as he was about to be used in the first team and ended up losing space after the returns of Calleri, André Silva and Ryan himself, all of whom had been injured.

BELÉM BACK

Finally, center-back Matheus Belém, who has long been sidelined at São Paulo, had already agreed everything with FK Qabala of Azerbaijan, but the deal fell through.

The Cotia academy product even traveled to the country for trials with the team and played in a friendly for Qabala. However, the way the club wanted to draft the contract did not please the player, who backed out and chose not to sign the deal, under which he would earn around R$25,000 per month.

In the negotiation, São Paulo would have released Belém on a free transfer, but retained a percentage of any future sale of the center-back.

Now, the player will return to São Paulo to resume training separately from the senior squad at Barra Funda and will look for new clubs to continue his career.

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