Fiorentina president Rocco Commisso has claimed he will be "tougher" when discussing the future of Lucas Torreira as they try and sign the midfielder on a permanent deal this summer.
The Arsenal deep-lying playmaker has impressed during his season-long loan spell at the Serie A side this season, featuring 35 times in all competitions. He also played a vital role as Fiorentina reached the semi finals of the Coppa Italia, while finishing seventh in Serie A.
However, it is understood Torreira is not in Mikel Arteta's plans ahead of the 2022/23 season. He was sent out on loan to Atletico Madrid last campaign, making 19 La Liga appearances in total.
Now after an impressive season at Fiorentina, the Italian club want to sign him on a permanent deal for a fee reportedly in the region of £10million. The 26-year-old has just a year left on his contract at Arsenal, but the deal could be on the verge of collapsing if the required amount is not agreed.
There was a growing sense that those negotiations would reach a positive conclusion, with Sport Witness claiming Arsenal were confident they would be selling Torreira sooner rather than later. But it seems as though they are wide of the mark - something Commisso is not happy about.
"I am very disappointed with what happened in the 24 hours after we won the conference," he told Tuttomercatoweb. "Unfortunately, as happened with Gattuso, certain fans fell for it with the petition for Torreira. The agents got this news out.
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"The agents have to understand me like I did with Gattuso or Vlahovic; they won’t win with me. I’ll be tougher and get angry. I don’t want to talk about the market because I’m not here to talk about that.
"There are the insiders who will think about that. I know I’m disappointing you, but I won’t talk about the market. There may be the possibility of revisiting the situation with Torreira in the coming weeks, but I don’t want to give any hint of optimism or pessimism."
Torreira's agent, Oscar Bentancourt told Fiorentina News : "The basic problem is that Lucas earned a higher salary at Arsenal than he took in Florence.
"When we agreed on the €1.5 million loan with Arsenal last summer, I got from the English club that Fiorentina would not pay that money if Lucas played at least 25 games.
"With this, we set the option-to-buy at €15million (£12.8m), payable in 6 instalments of €2.5m (£2.1m) by 2025. We had agreed on a (player) contract with Fiorentina for the coming seasons of €2.7million (£2.3m) net a year. Fiorentina, however, now wanted to lower both his salary and the cost of the transfer."
