Ever Banega renews Sevilla contract?

For quite some time there had been reports that Inter had been negotiating with Ever Banega so that he could sign with Inter when his contract ended at the end of the season. Once outlets had reported that the Argentine midfielder had agreed to a contract, it seemed all but official that he would be arriving at Inter for free for next season. Now that seems like that will not happen, because Sevilla's sporting director said today that Banega's contract has been automatically renewed until 2017.

Apparently the 27 year old had a clause in his contract that triggered an automatic one-year contract extension if he made 30+ appearances this season. Once he made his appearance against Villareal during the weekend he hit that goal and according to Ramón Rodríguez Verdejo any moves away from the club during the summer for free are now not possible. This would probably explain why the club was so lax in their negotiations with Banega during the season, for them it did not matter if he wanted more money than they were willing to offer him. All they had to do was play him 30 times and he would have to stay making (probably) as much as he had been making before.

While it seems that any move to Inter is now dead there is some hope that he might still solve our midfield creativity problems. Reports in Spain indicate that Banega might be willing to take Sevilla to court because he doesn't think that the renewal clause is binding. It is unclear what will happen with Ever Banega, but his chances of joining the nerazzurri just got a lot lower.