EXCLUSIVE: PSG hold transfer talks with Napoli's Victor Osimhen

Peter Staunton

Updated: 25 Jul 2024 18:11 BST
3 min read

Victor Osimhen, The Transfers Podcast — © IMAGO

Victor Osimhen has met Paris Saint-Germain for direct discussions about joining the French Ligue 1 club, The Transfers Podcast can report.

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The Napoli striker has strong connections with PSG through Luis Campos, their football advisor, who signed him for Lille and then sold him to Napoli for an initial €70 million in 2020.

Osimhen developed into Serie A's top scorer with 31 and 39 games during Napoli's Scudetto-winning season in 2022/23, prompting PSG to make him their primary target for that centre-forward position last summer.

The Transfers Podcast understands that PSG offered Napoli €150m for Osimhen but the Serie club refused to sell, asking for €200m.

Goncalo Ramos and Kolo Muani were signed instead by PSG as part of a huge rebuild ahead of the first season under Luis Enrique.

Off the back of a much poorer season for Napoli, no one has been willing to pay Osimhen’s €130m release clause and Napoli are understood to have dropped their asking price to €100m. That remains too much for PSG.

One of the keys in this move will be offloading one of Ramos or Kolo Muani.

Both were requested by Enrique last summer only to be sidelined during the season. The Spanish coach is pushing PSG to sign a new forward.

Though PSG emphasise that neither striker is for sale, it’s understood one would be allowed to leave should the right money come in for them.

How PSG's Osimhen deal impacts Lukaku

© IMAGO - Romelu Lukaku and Antonio Conte

A sale would create space for Osimhen at PSG, enabling Antonio Conte to be reunited with Chelsea's Romelu Lukaku once again.

“Lukaku and Conte are basically a match made in heaven,” Kristof Terreur, European football correspondent for Het Laatste Nieuws, tells the Transfers Podcast.

“Conte got Lukaku to Inter for €74 million and pushed him to his best level. Lukaku under Conte was unplayable and that's why Chelsea decided to buy him back in 2021 for €113 million.”