Badelj nixes Paredes swap

Milan Badelj has not drawn nearly as much interest on the transfer market as he might have hoped. In fact, despite the whispered promises of big bids from AC Milan, Inter Milan, and Chelsea, nobody’s even tried to come and take the Croatian international away from all this. Of course, his own pickiness is partly at fault, since he just turned down a move to AS Roma.

The Giallorossi had mooted a player swap which would have seen Leandro Paredes move the other way. While it would have been a pretty good deal for both sides—Paredes is a bit more forward thinking than most of the other Viola midfielders, while Badelj would immediately take over as a backup for Daniele de Rossi and Kevin Strootman—it’s not meant to be.

Instead, the Bad Elf is left at a club he clearly doesn’t want to play at, waiting for an offer that doesn’t look likely to arrive this month, as he and his manager and teammates try to pretend like nothing’s wrong. It’s an unpleasant situation, but at this point, he has no one to blame but himself.