Some potentially good news on the Lucas Moura front

We heard a few weeks ago that we had bid on Lucas Moura and that amount was confirmed yet again today. Many media outlets have been reporting quotes from Moura's agent this morning, I'll link you the Sky Sports article just due to the general awesomeness of the picture they used. Several quotes caught my eye as being somewhat interesting:

Sao Paulo have not expressed an interest in selling Lucas, but I can say that we've heard from people connected with the club over an offer from Chelsea for €35million.

This more or less confirms what we already knew...Chelsea have legitimate interest in adding Moura to the youth movement at the bridge. This is good news on several fronts. We've set the bar pretty high here for other European clubs if they want to get involved with the bidding for the young star, so I'd guess we can safely eliminate the vast majority of Europe as legitimate suitors now. This would also lead us to believe that we're pretty close with the club on a deal with the club should the player feel ready to test himself in England. The price seems fairly reasonable in my eyes so that's always a plus. On a somewhat less positive note:

Lucas does not have the desire to leave Sao Paulo, so we've not started any talks with a club abroad. I can assure you the boy will remain with Sao Paulo until the summer.

That pretty solidly rules out a move in January. That's not the worst news ever, but as one of the few non-cup tied players we've been linked with he'd have been a nice fit. It does appear that the player may be willing to leave in June though, so hopefully we continue to show interest. Regardless of your feelings on Moura as a player this news is generally very good. We're definitely looking at young world class talent, and we're definitely willing to spend large amounts of money to secure that talent. With several players likely heading to new homes come June that can only be viewed as a positive.