Crystal Palace chairman Steve Parish has confirmed that the club had an offer for Genoa’s Christian Kouame accepted, as reported on Sky Sports.
Palace were on the brink of securing his signature before the youngster suffered a knee injury, which is likely to keep him out for the remainder of the season.
Palace opted not to complete the transfer due to the injury and Parish said to Palace TV:
We had a £10m bid accepted on Kouame, unfortunately, he had a cruciate injury a week after.
It was outside the window that we’d agreed on the deal so they were still playing him.
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As reported on Goal, the Ivory Coast striker eventually joined fellow Italian Serie A side Fiorentina on loan, with an option to buy him permanently at the end of the season.
Before the injury, the 22-year-old forward had scored five times in the Serie A, which proves that he could have been the answer to Palace’s goalscoring woes.
Roy Hodgson’s side has scored the lowest number of goals in the top-flight this season and the manager himself has admitted that his side has struggled in that aspect for several months.
Therefore, we feel that missing out on a goalscorer like Kouame feels like an even bigger blow, but we can’t help but feel there’s a huge element of luck missing for the club because just as they were going to sign him, he suffered the injury.
