Riyad Mahrez has admitted that he’s eager for Leicester to open talks with Roma over a move.

Following Leicester’s 2-1 pre-season win over Borussia Monchengladbach on Friday, Mahrez admitted that he would like the Foxes to open talks with Roma, who have been heavily linked with a move for the winger this summer.

“I will continue to give his best for the club [until they accept an offer],” Mahrez told Sky Sports.

“(Roma) are great club who I’d like to talk to. I can’t until Leicester accept a deal.”

Roma sporting director Monchi claims that there’s been no development in the Mahrez situation.

“The situation with Mahrez has not changed,” he said.

“I would like to say a couple of things, though. A club like Roma, who can boast the calibre of players like [Lorenzo] Pellegrini, [Kevin] Strootman, [Radja] Nainggolan, [Edin] Dzeko, [Federico] Fazio or [Aleksandar] Kolarov, cannot think that their overall performance is going to depend on the arrival of just one specific right-winger.

“The guarantee comes from the route you are on and the group you have.

“The second message I wanted to give is that I don’t know if Mahrez or somebody else will come but, whoever arrives, he will be a big player who is able to add quality to an already magnificent squad.”

Meanwhile, Leicester manager, Craig Shakespeare, revealed that the Algeria international would prefer to stay in England, reports ESPN.

Interestingly, the Metro have gone with the angle that if Mahrez joins Roma, he’s somehow snubbing Arsenal, since the Gunners were linked with the 26-year-old earlier in the window.

metro mahrez roma

 

However, it seems that while Arsenal’s interest was probably genuine at one stage, Arsene Wenger has quite obviously been focusing his attention on Monaco winger, Thomas Lemar.

Therefore, claiming that Mahrez is ‘snubbing’ Arsenal for Roma when even Shakespeare says that the star would rather stay in England doesn’t seem strictly accurate.

All this comes just days after the Serie A club were said to have ‘dropped’ their interest in the winger in order to chase Liverpool’s to Emre Mor.

£47m for a player who, despite winning Leicester’s player of the season when they won the title in 2015/16, only scored just six Premier League goals last term and assisted four, is a bit pricey.

This reported transfer fee also may go some way in explaining why it appears that the Metro have got it the wrong way around when they claim that it’s Mahrez snubbing Arsenal.