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Cadena SER reported Wednesday night that Atlético Madrid on Tuesday received and rejected an €8 million offer from Crystal Palace for goalkeeper Miguel Ángel Moyá.
The 33-year-old — now into the final year of his contract — was sought after to bolster Frank de Boer’s options between the sticks. Palace have no points and no goals through three games and have conceded six times during that span, but the Londoners saw an offer of €3 million plus a further €5 million in add-ons turned down. Now, they will have to look elsewhere after Diego Simeone intervened to keep Moyá at the club.
According to SER, Simeone wants Moyá to stay as Jan Oblak’s backup, as third goalkeeper Axel Werner is just 21 years old and has no Liga Santander experience. Moyá, meanwhile, donned the captain’s band during the Audi Cup in preseason and has nearly 250 league caps to his name. Besides, Atlético could not sign a replacement due to the FIFA-imposed registration ban and wouldn’t have much time to do so anyway, as the window closes on Friday.
Moyá will probably be counted on again during Copa del Rey matches later in the year and will be the go-to if Oblak gets hurt. Since his arrival from Getafe in summer 2014, Moyá has shown himself to be a consistently reliable backup to Oblak, and it’s probably the right decision to prefer him to Werner, who needs seasoning or another loan spell before he’s seriously considered for the first team.