Transfer Speculation
In
March 2007,
French club
OSC Lille showed interested in acquiring Dica, but Steaua refused any offers saying that he will not move to any clubs next season.
In
August 2007, Steaua had two offers for Dica - from
CFR Cluj and
Benfica Lisbon, from Romania and
Portugal respectively. Both clubs were willing to pay a fee of
€5 million. Benfica's manager watched Dica in his game for
Romania against
Turkey. Despite the offers,
Gigi Becali said that he wouldn't let Dica go for less than €8 million.
Aston Villa of the
English Premier League offered a sum in the region of €3.5 million for the services of Dica, but nothing concluded.
[5]
Another offer came in for Dica on
13 October 2007 from
Greek side,
Olympiacos C.F.P.. The club was willing to pay €5 million and an annual salary of €750,000.
[6]
On
November 21,
2007 Portuguese paper
A Bola reported that
SL Benfica were bidding €9 million for the Romanian. 3 days later, several English media sources linked Dica with Aston Villa again, though nothing concluded before the closeure of the English
transfer window on
31st January 2008[7].
In early
2008, Nicolae Dica has been tracked by serveral important teams across Europe like
FC Dynamo Moscow[8],
Manchester City[9] and
Valencia CF[10]. The last one offering €5 million for the Romanian international.
On
May 19,
2008 Italian club
Catania showed interest in the attacking midfielder.
Catania's coach
Walter Zenga has worked with Dica in Romania and hopes to convince the highly-rated midfielder about moving to Sicily for next season. Steaua owner, Gigi Becali, has lowered the possible transfer fee down to €3 million.
