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Gonzalo Higuain, fresh off setting a new Serie A goalscoring record last season, is ready for a new challenge.
His brother and agent, Nicolas recently gave an interview to Radio Marca, in which he claimed that the striker is not exactly happy with "the Napoli project" (whatever that means) and that the 28-year-old has "made it clear" that he will not be renewing his contract that has two more years to run.
Our friends over at The Siren's Song have already taken an extensive look at the full interview and its full set of confusing, incendiary, and sometimes flat out wrong comments, but here's the part that we might be interested in the most.
"He came to Napoli with great enthusiasm. However, in my opinion the project is nowhere near what Gonzalo expects. Gonzalo will not renew but he will respect the contract because he is a professional."
"There are at least four or five teams that can afford Higuaín both in Spain and England and there is also PSG and Bayern Munich."
"Simeone is a great coach, in the last three years he's been in two Champions League finals despite not having a huge budget. [Maurizio] Sarri is also a great coach, but we'll see in the future if Gonzalo will be trained by Guardiola, Conte, or Simeone."
-Nicolas Higuain; source: Radio Marca via Guardian
Considering that Napoli threatened to sue the last team that made even a cursory approach for one of their players, I'm not sure people will be head over heels gunning for Higuain at this moment. But unless he wants to move this summer, then it doesn't make much sense for his agent to be stirring the pot this vigorously.
Given that Chelsea are about to sign Batshuayi, Higuain is not really on our radar. The signing of the young Belgian could also indicate a return to the pre-Mourinho m.o. of spending big on younger players rather than the more fully formed, already established types like a Costa or a Fabregas or a 28-year-old Higuain with a €94m release clause.