Samardzic sr: "My son wanted Inter but they only spoke with Pimenta. Never asked for money"
Mladen Samardzic spoke to Sport Italia about what happened with Inter: here is his reconstruction.
Mladen Samardzic speaks. Lazar's father, a player treated by Inter, with whom he also carried out medical examinations, gave his version of his son's failure to move to the Nerazzurri to Sport Italia: "Inter made a mistake: they did all the negotiation and closed the deal with a person who did not have permission to do so."
It's about Rafaela Pimenta, I suppose.
"Of course, she. But I have only seen her once in my life. I don't know how she got into this thing, because the negotiation was between Udinese and Inter: then we found herself in the middle, who wanted to close the deal without our permission. So when I received the draft contract from Inter and we saw that she was there as Lazar's intermediary and representative, we asked for this to be changed. We asked to speak directly with Inter, to have a meeting with them and to change this aspect: but they obviously did not want to do the operation anymore so, without her, they claimed that Lazar's agent was her."
Is it true that Inter did not respond to your calls in those days and in mid-August?
"Of course, we called them. We also wrote an email. No answer, because for Inter everything was over because they wanted to deal only with Pimenta. They had closed the deal with her, but not with us. She has no permission from us: she had done the operation with Inter because obviously she has many players there and has a good relationship with the club, but there was no agreement with us, nor any authorization."
Have you ever met Beppe Marotta or Piero Ausilio to talk about this?
"Yes, we met that Friday (August 11, ed) in Milan and I explained everything to them. I explained to him that there was no permission for Pimenta to speak on behalf of Lazar. But they didn't want to talk about anything anymore because they were very angry because they kept saying that she was the agent. But you can check everywhere, even on the internet, that Pimenta was never my son's agent. The "communication problem" was just that, because my son wanted to go to Inter, Udinese wanted to sell him to Inter and Inter wanted to take him. Everything was ok, if it wasn't for this "communication problem".
So it is not true that there was a problem of money and commissions.
"Look, we never talked about money with Inter. We never bargained on anything, we did not have the opportunity because the moment I explained that Pimenta was not the agent, automatically for Inter everything was already closed and they were no longer interested, because, we do not know why, they thought that Rafaela Pimenta was the agent. I said "sorry I'm sorry but it's a mistake, if you have evidence about this thing ok, but since you don't have it is not our fault". I'm sorry, but we showed that we wanted to go to Inter and that we never talked about money."
Do you reproach yourself for anything in this negotiation?
"Nothing, because we had no opportunity to do anything, what mistake would we have made? I don't know. I asked Mr. Aiuto where I was going wrong, to tell me. And he told me he didn't know who the agents were. And then I said, "It's not my fault, you could ask." And then at that point it was me who said, "We want to see the contracts, we want to see the offer with a written email and not just on the phone. We want to see the signing, the bonuses." And yet we saw nothing written, no documents. Because they had sent everything to Rafaela Pimenta and they had made a mistake. The first time I sat in the Inter office, I said to Mr. Ausilio "Look, I've never seen any contract so far, no offer." So he printed it out to me on that date and I said, "Here, now it's the first time I've seen these numbers." And it was all over, he said we had nothing more to discuss, he said that Inter has 150 years of history, that it made the Champions League Final... And I said, "Of course you're right, but there was a miscommunication here, I'm sorry."
But why did they behave like this: if they wanted the player...
"I don't know, I don't know. I have no experience in these affairs, I am just a father who wants the best for his son. He plays in Udine, because he loves football: surely he always wants to improve and wants to play one day in the Champions League, but this is only possible if he grows, playing better and better with Udinese. We don't care about money: if we wanted it, we could go to Saudi Arabia. We want a career and Inter was definitely a good situation, but honestly... The operation could not be done. Maybe with another club next time. We have nothing to regret, because I couldn't have done anything else, since Inter didn't want to talk to us. I said the same thing to Mr. Pozzo, in Udine, who understood the situation. This is the whole truth, then certainly the journalists, who have good relations with Inter, write and report a single version, but the truth is not that. Never mind. My son is very happy in Udine and if we stay here, we will make him happy, there is no problem".
So the player does not want to leave.
"We have an excellent relationship with Udinese, with Mr. Pozzo, with Director Collavino and with the new ds Balzaretti: we all work together for the future and if Udinese tell us that they have had an offer that they consider valid, we will talk about it with my son. If Udinese say yes and we say yes, it will be the right decision to make, but it is not necessary for them to leave this year. He has 3 years on his contract and a future ahead to change clubs: when we find a perfect situation for all parties, for the club and for us, we will see."
Someone in the days when the deal with Inter was missed had written that there was another club behind it...
"It wasn't really true. We don't have any teams. We are not in a hurry for the future: Lazar is only 21 years old, there is so much time. Already with Juve he entered well and showed that he is concentrated: he is a mature boy, he has his head on his shoulders and does not want to betray the Udinese fans and obviously the company that brought him to Italy and is making him grow. This is also why it was important to tell the truth: the big clubs have powerful communication and we do not, but a false and wrong reconstruction that damaged us cannot pass on to public opinion."
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