Chapter 116 A Club Comes Knocking

After Sassania lowered the price, more clubs became interested, and some even started making offers.

To avoid offering this super center forward to their domestic rivals, he didn't market Chen Hero to Russian teams. This time, he targeted almost every European team except those in Russia.

Naturally, teams from all sorts of leagues came to inquire. Even teams from leagues in Greece, Romania, and Yugoslavia...

Sassania didn't care whether Chen Hero would accept these teams or not. He only cared about their offers.

He would talk about the ones he was satisfied with, and ignore the rest.

After he screened them, he would present them to Chen Hero for his opinion.

He was venting his frustration from screening the clubs because he thought these clubs were too shameless! Absolutely shameless! They still thought fifteen million euros was too expensive, with most offers ranging from eight to ten million. Some clubs even offered six million euros! If you don't have money, what are you buying stars for? What a joke! A record-breaking league top scorer, only nineteen years old, with great potential and a bright future, and they want to take him away for six million euros? Are they trying to pull a fast one on a Russian who's never seen euros before?!

Just then, he saw an offer and was about to quickly scan it and toss it aside, but his hand paused.

The offer stated twelve million euros.

This was the closest offer to his ideal price that he had seen in days...

The number made his eyes twitch. Following the number down, the team that sent the offer was... "napoli." Napoli?

His knowledge of Napoli Football Club was still stuck in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when Napoli was a prominent force in Italian football. Though not quite a powerhouse due to a lack of foundation, it was definitely a strong contender for a time. With players like Maradona and Careca, they were the strongest rivals to the Milanese giants back then.

Aside from that, Sassania knew nothing else about this team.

Were they even a Serie A team?

Who cares? At least they're offering more money!

With that thought, Sassania stopped caring about what level of team Napoli was. Twelve million euros was very close to his ideal price. He could negotiate and see if they could reach a suitable agreement.

With that in mind, he wrote Napoli's name on his memo.

As for how Napoli had taken a fancy to Chen Hero, he didn't care at all.

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"Napoli is interested in you. They've already made an offer to Zenit," Dekura said, trying to find out about every team that made an offer to Chen Hero and telling him about it in advance, so he could be prepared.

"Napoli?" At first, Chen Hero thought the name sounded familiar.

"Maradona," Dekura said, and Chen Hero slapped his thigh.

"So it's that team! The King of Football's team must be awesome!" He was slightly interested. "They're in Serie A, right?"

"This season, they are a newly promoted team in Serie A. They were promoted last summer."

"Oh, never mind..." Chen Hero felt like he had been doused with cold water and immediately lost interest.

A newly promoted team... He was a player who had participated in the UEFA Cup and scored seven goals. How could he go to a newly promoted team? Even if he couldn't join a powerhouse, he wouldn't sink so low as to play for a newly promoted team, would he?

He knew what being a newly promoted team meant. In the top leagues, newly promoted teams were practically synonymous with "tragedy." Those teams that had worked so hard, perhaps for five or ten years, to finally get promoted to the top league would be considered incredibly successful if they managed to avoid relegation after one season in the top league – a success that deserved a grand celebration by the fans of the city. In Chen Hero's opinion, fighting for survival every year was a bit pathetic.

"Really not going to consider it?" Dekura asked.

Chen Hero shook his head. "No. I'd rather go to Tottenham, at least that's the Premier League!"

"Can you get a work permit, Hero?"

"Uh... special talent clause?"

"Even then, it's not guaranteed."

"Hey, whatever. I'm not interested in a newly promoted team anyway." Chen Hero found these problems to be a headache. He wanted to go to a team that could at least participate in European competitions and score a lot of goals.

In reality, Tottenham might not be able to participate in European competitions either. They hadn't been doing so well this season, but at least it was the Premier League, and a London team to boot! What a stage that was!

Tottenham's manager, Redknapp, had expressed interest in him, and the team had also made an offer to Zenit. He didn't know how much Tottenham had offered, but when he heard Tottenham's name, he had already included them on his list of potential destinations.

Premier League teams had a natural advantage. Who could blame them, since the Premier League was currently the most successful football league in the world? Everyone said that the top five leagues in Europe started with the Premier League. Fierce competition, rivals filled with superstars, well-developed media, and a glamorous world of fame and fortune... all of this was attracting Chen Hero.

It was just like Dekura said: the work permit issue was troubling him. He didn't know if he could get one.

After ending his call with Dekura, Chen Hero continued his video call with Sharapova on his computer.

Sharapova felt very happy with her life now - she had found a boyfriend and gained love. And her career had also taken a turn for the better. It could be said that she had both love and career success.

At the Australian Open in early 2008, she faced many strong opponents, but she still advanced to the final. In particular, defeating the top seed Henin in the quarterfinals again boosted her confidence. In the final, she defeated Ivanovic 2:0 to win her third Grand Slam title.

In the next two months, she extended her winning streak to twenty-three games, including her first appearance for Russia in the Federation Cup and winning the title at the Doha station.

Her participation in the Federation Cup for Russia also gave her the opportunity to secretly run to St. Petersburg to date her lover.

After the Federation Cup, Sharapova left Russia again and returned to the United States for training.

Sharapova always felt that meeting Chen Hero had brought her good luck.

She had not only recovered from her shoulder injury, but also won last year's WTA Finals and this year's first Grand Slam tournament, the Australian Open.

Her tennis career seemed to be entering a new high point.

She increasingly felt that meeting and getting to know Chen Hero was arranged by God and was the right thing to do. She was already considering finding a suitable opportunity to make her relationship with Chen Hero public.

To say that this boyfriend was good in every way, but there was one thing that she couldn't accept - his reputation.

A playboy? This instinctively made her feel a sense of crisis and insecurity. She was always worried that one day he would meet a more beautiful, sexier, and more romantic woman than her, and Chen Hero, the "Prince of Nightclubs," would fall in love with someone else.

Honestly, she wasn't sure if she could hold onto this man's heart. She also knew that compared to those women, she wasn't quite as charming. But she just couldn't let go. She could drink and speed, but in bed, she was just too shy and not passionate enough...

She tried hard to be more passionate, but didn't make much progress.

"Was that your agent calling?" Putting aside the messy thoughts in her head, Sharapova asked Chen Hero.

"Yeah, telling me that another team is interested in me!" Although it was a team that Chen Hero defined as newly promoted, the fact that more teams were interested in him meant that his popularity had increased by one point. So when he talked about it, Chen Hero was in a good mood.

"Really? Congratulations!" Sharapova 100% supported Chen Hero's decision to leave Russia. Although her home country was also Russia, she herself didn't stay in Russia.

The Russian league was a bitter, cold land for the football world. It was a closed world that no one was interested in. So Chen Hero could only leave here and go to other leagues to have the opportunity to become a truly first-class star - Sharapova never doubted his strength. He just lacked a big enough stage.

"But it's just a relegation team..." Chen Hero labeled Napoli as a "relegation team." I wonder what Napoli's owner, De Laurentiis, would look like when he found out that the team he had set two ambitious five-year plans for had been labeled as a "relegation team" by a player he had taken a fancy to?

Hearing that it was a relegation team, Sharapova didn't know what to say.

She knew that Chen Hero was an ambitious person. Just like he was unwilling to stay in Zenit St. Petersburg, he would definitely not go to a relegation team - if that was the case, he might as well stay in Zenit. At least in Zenit, there was hope of participating in European competitions, either the Champions League or the UEFA Cup.

"Okay, I hope you find a team that you like!"

"Hey, don't talk about that. When can you come to St. Petersburg again?"

A look of embarrassment appeared on Sharapova's face.

"I..."

"I know, you have your career." Chen Hero rolled his eyes.

Since his relationship with Sharapova was confirmed, he hadn't been to a nightclub. But as a man, he was always without a woman, and his Eat, Drink, and Be Merry Gang teammates were always running out to have fun, which made him a little itchy...

After ending his call with Sharapova, Chen Hero felt a little depressed and suffocated. He couldn't go to nightclubs to find women, and the Eat, Drink, and Be Merry Gang didn't even take him out anymore... But he was a normal man, right? The longing could at least be relieved by talking to Sharapova, but what about his physical needs?

He sighed, opened the F drive on his computer, hesitated, and then clicked on a folder named "Calabash Brothers"...

Was there a more miserable professional player than him!

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ps, some people say this is filler, but it's not. It's just that football novels can't just be about the protagonist scoring goals. This is the most important turning point in Chen Hero's career, so of course it has to be written well and in detail.

Necessary things still have to be explained. You can't just skip over everything that's not related to scoring goals. If I did that, I might as well just give everyone the outline, so there's no filler at all, just dry content that's hard to swallow.

So if you think this chapter doesn't have goals and isn't exciting or passionate, don't rush to complain that it's filler.

Seventy percent of an adult's body is liquid, only thirty percent is dry matter. But it is this water that keeps everyone alive.

A book is the same. Without the "water" of necessary and full plots, the book is unreadable...

I hope everyone is patient. After the transfer plot, it will be exciting.