Viktor Gyokeres looks set for one or two appearances in court, as his agent sues Sporting CP and a couple of media publications in Sweden.
Felix Keith reports for the Mirror that Viktor Gyokeres has been called to testify in a legal case in Sweden, involving the player’s agent Hasan Cetinkaya.
Cetinkaya has filed a lawsuit for gross defamation against media publications published by Fotboll Sthlm and Expressen, with the publications claiming the agent and his agency had ties to criminal gangs.
Cetinkaya previously reported the outlets to the media ombusman in Sweden, but he’s now escalated the matter to the Stockholm District Court. The agent’s lawyer Joakim Lundqvist has confirmed that Gyokeres has agreed to testify on the stand, if required.
Elsewhere, Portuguese outlet Correio da Manha report in their print edition on Monday, September 8th that Cetinkaya also plans to sue Sporting CP, and that Gyokeres will side with him in that case as well.
Though the lawsuit hasn’t been filed yet, CdM report that Cetinkaya is preparing to file the lawsuit against Sporting over the money he missed out on with Gyokeres’ transfer to Arsenal.
Arsenal fans may remember the dispute, with Cetinkaya and Gyokeres claiming Sporting had previously agreed to let him leave for €60m plus €10m in add-ons, before Sporting ended up demanding €70m plus €10m in add-ons – a fee the Gunners weren’t willing to pay.
Cetinkaya gave up his ~10% share of the transfer fee so that Arsenal could pay just €63.5m plus €10m, and the deal could go ahead.
But Cetinkaya will argue that he was illegitimately urged to give up the fee that was his by right, and that he only acceded to that pressure to avoid harming his client’s future.
The agent is also set to argue he was the victim of slander, with Sporting president Frederico Varandas making multiple public statements against Cetinkaya before the transfer went through.
It looks like we’re going to keep hearing about one of the summer’s messiest transfers for a while yet.