Real Madrid negotiating deal for Kovacic

Remember back when Liverpool was sniffing around Mateo Kovacic and the fans freaked out? There was the whole #savekovacic and the club decided that he wasn't for sale and everybody was happy (well maybe not Liverpool but whatever). Then Shaqiri got sold and (while it sucked) most figured that would be the big sale for the team this transfer market and no other stars would have to leave.

Turns out that might not be the case. Reports have surfaced that Real Madrid have begun negotiations to buy Kovacic. Apparently out of the blue the Spanish club submitted a series of bids for the Croatian midfielder and Inter are believed to be open to accepting an offer of around  €30-35m. A number of sources have also stated that Kovacic is open to heading to Madrid as well and that a deal will be finalized soon. Though Mancini is interested in Madrid's fullback Fabio Coentrao, he most likely will not be involved in this deal.

This is such a bad move. The team has a great young core of players to build around and we are slowly selling them off piece by piece. Kovacic may have been struggling to find his place in the team but that was mainly because he was constantly dealing with new coaches and new positions in the lineup. Once he began to have consistent instructions from Mancini he was improving greatly. He is the team's most creative player and yet they want to sell him a week before the start of the season? I can't even think about who the club would bring in to replace him because I still can't get over the fact that they're willing to sell him in the first place...

I'm hoping that Mancini, Ausilio, and Thohir realize that this is a bad idea and pull out. Or that this is all just transfer market speculation that some reporter started just to troll us. Until the move is made official I'm just going to believe that.