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We’ve expected for awhile that Fiorentina would decline the €7 million option to make Carlos Salcedo’s loan move permanent. His agent indicated el Titan’s desire to establish himself in European football back in January, rather than return to Chivas and the Liga MX. Given his, er, rugged style of defending, we thought that a move to a bottom-half Premier League club, or maybe even the Championship, would be his best option. Instead, though, Eintracht Frankfurt have announced that they’ll have him on loan for a year, probably with the same option to buy that Fiorentina passed on.
It’s a good signing for die Adler. Salcedo, despite his struggles in Florence, is one of the most promising young defenders to come out of Mexico in the past several years and, at 23 years old, has plenty of room to improve. Especially with loanees Jesús Vallejo and Michael Hector returning to Real Madrid and Chelsea, respectively, Frankfurt have an opening for a centerback with experience on in a back three; Salcedo’s power and athleticism should help him fit right in.
He’ll finish his Viola career with 20 appearances and an assist, but it’s the 7 bookings and the penchant for giving up stupid fouls on the edge of the area and completely avoidable penalties that we’ll remember. We were always willing to cut him some slack, though, because he never looked comfortable at fullback, where Paulo Sousa generally used him until dropping him for most of 2017 in favor of the more reliable (can’t believe I just wrote that) Nenad Tomović.
We wish el Titan the best on his new adventure. For the player, it’s a perfect fit: the club needs him, his skills fit the need, and he’ll almost certainly get regular playing time. He’ll also have international teammate Marco Fabian on the roster to help him get acclimated. As a fun footnote, he’ll be the third ex-Viola player to join Frankfurt in the past few years: Haris Seferović just moved to Benfica, and Ante Rebić will return, albeit briefly, to Fiorentina after a year on loan.