Jose Cifuentes has hit out at Universidad Catolica after blocking a likely move to Porto.
The midfielder had been expected to join the Portuguese side this week but remains in Ecuador despite interest from Europe.
Last month Neil Lennon admitted that Cifuentes was on his radar but the trail appears to have gone cold with Celtic’s European prospects still to be decided.
There were suggestions yesterday that the midfielder was about to step onto a flight to Portugal but today the player was quoted by Zero Zero about his frustrations.
“The talks are over, said the club president himself [Universidad Católica]. They won’t sell me, they need me and I have the desire to leave the country. This is very demotivating because every footballer thinks of leaving and now that I have the opportunity they won’t let me,” said the young midfielder. “My future is hard to solve. There have already been two offers rejected by the club that owns my sports rights, I want to quit, but they don’t give me that freedom. The offers were from Manchester City, FC Porto and one from the United States.”
A move to Celtic would seem unlikely but while the deal with Porto stalls there may be an option to move to Scotland still alive.
At the start of this month The Sun reported that the player and his agents were on a 40% cut off any transfer fee meaning that just over £1m of a £2m fee would go directly to Universidad Catolica.