La Liga and European champions Real Madrid are pondering over a summer swoop for Bayern Munich striker Robert Lewandowski.
According to a report in Spanish outlet Don Balon, Real Madrid are keeping an eye on the Polish hitman and are considering him as a replacement for Ronaldo, who is said to be looking to leave the Spanish capital in the summer due to his treatment by the local tax authorities.
The report goes on to state that Bayern Munich would be willing to let the Polish International leave, but only if the European Champions table an offer in the excess of €100 million, something Real would easily be able to pay with the money generated from a possible Ronaldo sale.
Ronaldo only recently signed a new 6-year contract with the club, so Los Blancos would comfortably be able to command a huge transfer fee for him from any interested parties. We may even see Ronaldo smash a world record transfer fee for the second time in his career.
The Portuguese Captain is reportedly furious at the charges made by Spanish courts, who allegedly claim that he has evaded £14.7 million in taxes. The allegations placed on him by Madrid’s regional state prosecutor are of 4 counts of tax fraud, related to image rights earned between 2011 and 2014.
The report further states that Arsenal superstar Alexis Sanchez is set for a move to the Allianz arena after agreeing to move to the Bavarians giants. The deal will reportedly be finalized before the end of this month and will set Bayern back by around €90 million.
So needless to say, Bayern will look to recuperate some of that by the sale of Lewandowski. Another daunting task they will face is finding an adequate replacement for the striker, who has been nothing short of prolific in the past 3 years for them.
Whoever does eventually come in to replace the former Borussia Dortmund striker will certainly have big shoes to fill. Thomas Muller is the only other striker in their squad and while Sanchez could fulfill that role, as he has shown this past season, he would be better utilised as a winger.
Zinedine Zidane & co. will certainly be trying their best to convince their talisman to stay on at the Bernabeu, but should they fail to convince him to do so, they will definitely be considering other players besides Lewandowski, who may come for a lesser price.
Lewandowski, like Ronaldo, has a contract which runs till the summer of 2021. However, paying over €100 million for a striker who is about to turn 29 in a few months may prove to be too much, even for a club with the financial might of Real Madrid.
