Juicy valuation for man with 32-goal contributions must be upheld this summer – opinion
Former Leeds player and pundit Noel Whelan has named his valuation for Raul Jimenez, and while it is impossible to predict whether it’s accurate, it is one which Wolves should stick to.
While speaking to Football Insider, he answered a series of questions about the player being linked to Real Madrid.
This follows report from Spanish outlet Don Balon which suggest the Mexican is ready to be targetted by Zinedine Zidane’s side as he looks for a player to act as good company for Karim Benzema, while they can let Mariano depart and give Luka Jovic some more game time by sending him out on loan.
Within the interview, Whelan backed the player to impress at that level, but said it would be hard to get him from Wanderers as they are likely to demand “around the £80-90million mark”.
There has been no official valuation for the player by any means, but given the importance he has to this Wolves team, they have every right to be asking for that sort of money.
After being bought for £34m in the summer, the 28-year-old signed a deal which will see his contract end in 2023. Considering that the player will turn 29 in May, that means they have him contracted until he is 32.
Is Raul Jimenez good enough for Real Madrid?
With Patrick Cutrone departing in January, there is no doubt that he is the club’s most important striker. And in all honesty, there’s hardly a queue of players in that squad lining up to take his place. Leonardo Campana seems to be the only obvious striking replacement, while Pedro Neto and Diogo Jota are both capable of playing through the middle, but are not naturals.
This means that replacing him becomes an enormous task. It is not cheap nor easy to replace a player who has scored 22 goals and assisted 10 in 44 games this year, meaning that they have the right to ask for a lot of money.
In this current market, £90m seems a fair price to ask one of the world’s biggest clubs to pay for their star asset. And considering they have just bought the player for £34m, they should not be bullied into selling him for less, especially considering they have reached the latter stages of the Europa League and are pushing for Champions League qualification.