Benfica News for 12/12/07

Taking a look through the major Portuguese Sport online Dailies:

Portuguese Cup drawing - Benfica drew Feirense at home for the 5 round of the portuguese cup. Feirense is currently 12th in the Vitalis League ( Portugal's second flight). Porto drew Desportivo das Aves, which will have Romeu Ribeiro, Miguel Victor and Dabao in their squad by the time the game takes place, January 20th.

Quim's back in practice. Benfica's #1 trained without limitations this morning and will be ready for this weekend's clash against Belenenses.

Miguel Victor will play with the Juniors for a couple more games before joining Desportivo das Aves in January. Benfica's junior coach, Joao Alves, requested that Victor give his contribution to the junior squad after losing a few of his defensive players to injuries. Victor played this last weekend, and will play another 2 games for the junior squad before going on his loan.

Binya has been called by the Cameroonian national team to play a friendly against a Galiza select squad. This is another game where Otto Pfister will have a chance to look at players before making his CAN 08 roster official. Binya might very well be on this roster list, which would mean that Benfica wouldn't be able to count on Binya for at least the month of January and some of February.

Benfica is trying to acquire the rest of Cardozo's pass from Newell's (20% = 2.2mm). Bergessio is most likely going to be included in the deal for the buyout in the form of a loan or even a sale. Benfica is also trying to acquire the other 20% of DiMaria's pass from Rosario Central.. just a quick explanation of these percentages that are usually left on the table. Buying clubs do this to cut the price, agreeing to leave a percentage of the players pass with the team they bought the player from, what this means is that any future deals involving the player would guarantee the first seller a percentage of the sale, in this case 20%. This is clear move by Benfica to secure future talent, while anticipating to make money with these two players, buying the 20% would naturally maximize Benfica's return.

Cesar Delgado, remains quiet as far as his move to Benfica goes. The player told the Mexican media he would not talk about the move until it's official. The player also denied having any kind of agreement with Benfica. Also in the race are Lyon, Palermo, Olympiacos and Espanhol.

here's a clip of Delgado

Leo's representatives are in Lisbon this week to discuss contract renovations with Benfica. Brazil's Fluminense is following the meetings very carefully as they would be Leo's next home if Leo and Benfica fail to reach an agreement.