Malouda Set To Depart Chelsea; Santos 'Scared' Of Wage Demands

I think we can all be pretty confident that Florent Malouda's Chelsea career is pretty much over. That said, it sounds like he might not be headed to Santos after all after head coach Muricy Ramalho publicly questioned his wage demands:

Malouda was offered to us. He is a very interesting player, but you get scared when they tell you their demands. They say they are in crisis in Europe, but they spend so much money on transfers there. He was offered to us, but when you think about his wages, it gets hard.

He is a very good player, an old-school midfielder who can hold the ball and set the tone in attack.

-Source: Sky Sports.

Some important things to remember, however. The first is that Ramalho isn't in charge of actually paying Malouda's wages -- he's not the one making the decisions and he's not in charge of financing the thing. All he knows is that Malouda wants a lot of money and that it's scary. Santos could be using him to talk to the media, of course, but if he's saying this for himself it doesn't mean much. Secondly, the fact that Malouda's being 'offered' to teams (and apparently on a free transfer) means he's done, and he has to know that. I'd be shocked if he started this season with Chelsea.