OFFICIALLY OFFICIAL: Juventus sign Leandro Paredes on loan with option to buy

On the final day of August, Max Allegri has officially seen Juventus sign the midfielder that he has been wanting to see arrive all summer long.

Juventus announced Wednesday that Argentina international Leandro Paredes has signed on loan with an option to buy from Paris Saint-Germain. Juve, who have a glutton of midfielders and still could see a few of them leave before the transfer window shuts until January, has been working on a deal for Paredes for weeks now, only able to agree to a potential transfer fee earlier this week. The Bianconeri will pay €22.6 million to make the loan move a permanent one, while it could also become an obligation to buy if certain sporting objectives are met.

In a twist you don’t usually see in these type of deals, if Juventus don’t sign Paredes they will still own Paris Saint-Germain €2.5 million.

The €22.6 million fee is much higher than anybody in the Italian media had reported over the course of the last 48 or 72 hours.

The official details of the deal, courtesy of Juventus’ press office:

Turin, 31 August 2022 - Juventus Football Club S.p.A. announces that an agreement has been finalized with Paris Saint-Germain Football s.a.s. for the free-of-charge temporary acquisition, until 30 June 2023, of the registration rights of the player Leandro Paredes. The agreement further entails:

• the obligation for Juventus to definitely acquire the player’s registrations rights, subject to the achievement of certain given sporting objectives by the end of the season 2022/2023;

• the right for Juventus to definitively acquire the player’s registration rights in case these given objectives are not achieved.

In both cases, the agreed consideration for the definitive acquisition is € 22.6 million, already including the solidarity contribution envisaged by FIFA regulations, payable in three years, with the addition of ancillary costs of € 2.2 million; the consideration might be increased up to a maximum of € 3.0 million upon achievement of further performance objectives over the duration of the employment contract with the player.

Upon achievement of specific sporting results and in the event that, neither the obligation nor the right to acquire the player’s registration rights should occur, Juventus will have to pay Paris Saint-Germain Football a consideration of € 2.5 million.

The potential transfer fee if Paredes is bought outright being much more than anybody had reported over the last few days is obviously the thing that jumps off the page. It’s not often that the Italian press — especially those that we pretty much post exclusively here — miss the mark by that much. Maybe a million or two, but not EVEN, with pretty much all of our main transfer reporters saying Juve was set to have a buy option around €15 million with another €5 million in add-ons.

Instead, Juve’s initial buy option will potentially cost them €22.6 million.

But that is apparently the price that Juve will have to pay for a player that Allegri clearly wanted. He had the characteristics that Allegri wanted, and he is very much the kind of midfielder that Allegri still felt the club needed this season.

What Paredes’ signing means for the other midfielders — namely Manuel Locatelli and, now that he’s getting more playing time, Fabio Miretti — will play out in time. Seeing as there wasn’t a big-time unveiling like there was with other signings this summer, Paredes seems to still be making his way to Turin as compared to taking his medicals and everything at Juventus’ facilities.

Either way, Paredes will be in Turin shortly. That’s because he’s now a Juventus player and likely the final signing of the summer transfer window.