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Comparing two of the hottest commodities in Serie A: Diawara vs. Paredes
Schalke 04 and Zenit St. Petersburg have seen their offers for Paredes rejected. AS Roma want € 20 million at least, but neither of the two clubs have offered than that sum yet. Luciano Spalletti thinks extremely high of the Paraguayan regista who impressed during his season loan spell at Empoli last term.
Paredes, 22, played 33 games with the Tuscans completing the 83.9% of passes, scoring two goals and registering one assist. He proved his qualities not only as a regista, but also as a defensive midfielder having won the 72.6% of tackles, made 49 interceptions and 20 clearances throughout last season.
Having created 41 goal chances, his impact on Empoli’s final third was also decisive despite Paredes was mainly deployed in front of defence by Marco Giampaolo who, in fact, has tried, in vain, to bring him to Sampdoria during the current transfer campaign.
Our transfer pundit Fabrizio Romano has revealed that Empoli could claim the central midfielder back, bringing him to the Castellani via Juventus that are considering a move for the 22-year-old midfielder.
Amadou Diawara is also a modern central midfielder. He has probably less quality than Paredes, but can cover the most territory in the middle of the pitch, protecting the defence better than his AS Roma counterpart.
Stats prove Diawara is a very promising holding midfielder even if he has still plenty of room to improve. The 19-year-old wants to leave Bologna and did not join his teammates for the preseason training camp at the beginning of the month, waiting for offers of other clubs sitting comfortably on his sofa at home. A behaviour that is not properly the right onefor a professional footballer who could become one of the best midfielders of his generation in the near future.
Diawara’s troublesome character emerged also on the pitch last season – his first in Serie A – when he picked up two red cards and 10 yellows (one less than Paredes). With 91 interceptions and 35 clearances, however, he imposed himself as one of the best holding midfielders of the entire league, so much so Chelsea were linked with welcoming his services last January.
Even if he made almost 300 passes less than Paredes, Diawara has a better passing accuracy (84.3& vs. 83.9%) and completed more recoveries than the Paraguayan.
Napoli have offered more than € 15 million plus bonus, a better proposal than AS Roma’s as the giallorossi put ‘just’ € 13 million on the table plus the loan of youngster Umar Sadiq.
Diawara is definitely what Maurizio Sarri needs to add some depth to the azzurri squad that lacked of cover in midfield when Allan begun his decline last season. The purchase of the promising midfielder will definitely boost the partenopei squad that will also be involved in the Champions League campaign in the 2016-17.
As far as Paredes is concerned, AS Roma should not even think about selling him to buy Diawara. Stats prove that their performances were very similar last term and even if the Guinean is three years younger, Paredes has enough quality to become the natural replacement of Miralem Pjanic on the long run. Selling him to a direct rival (Juventus) to buy Diawara would be nonsense, but with the Bologna midfielder who is close to joining Napoli, Luciano Spalletti will probably be happy to know that Paredes is not going to leave the Olimpico this summer.
Lorenzo Bettoni @lorebetto
