Radamel Falcao Transfer Rumors: Three-Team Race Heats Up For The Colombian Striker’s Services With Deadline Deal Looming [POLL]

With Real Madrid signing Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez on Sunday, it is now a three team race for the services of Colombian striker Radamel Falcao. Manchester United, Arsenal, and Manchester City have now become the three favorites to land the AS Monaco star. Falcao was a last minute scratch in AS Monaco’s 1-1 draw against Lille on Saturday. Falcao instead watched the game from the stands alongside his agent, leading many to believe he will be moved before Monday’s 6:00PM EST transfer deadline.

Later on Saturday after the Monaco game ended, Falcao tweeted “Dream come true #HalaMadrid”, confirming at the time what many believed to be the Colombian’s move to Real Madrid to join fellow countryman, James Rodriguez. However, that deal hit a snag that eventually lead to Los Blancos signing Chicharito instead and Falcao immediately deleted the tweet while telling the media the tweet was “fake”.

With Real Madrid out of the way, soccer aficionados had believed Falcao would be transferred to either Manchester United or Arsenal sometime on Sunday. However, those negotiations hit a stumbling block as dark horse and defending English Premier League champions, Manchester City entered the race at the last minute to try and snag the Monaco star.

Manchester City’s manager Manuel Pellegrini reportedly contacted Falcao’s agent, Jorge Mendes, letting him know that they would make a huge bid for the Colombian’s services, but there is a catch. Currently, City is under strict spending restrictions by UEFAs Financial Fair Play Rules. Before the summer transfer window opened, City was restricted to only $81 million dollars. After signing, Eliaquam Mangala, Fernando and Willy Caballero, City had reached the maximum amount they were allowed to spend and therefore presumably out of the race for Falcao or any other players for that matter.

Hold the phone however. After recently selling players Jack Rodwell, Gareth Barry and Javi Garcia, Manchester City has been able to get back $38 million in spending capital. But with Falcao’s agent reportedly asking for close to $80 million for his client’s talents, Manchester City is still very far away from striking a deal. Manchester City needs a miracle to obtain Falcao and they’re hoping that the Spanish team Valencia can help them with that. Valencia is apparently interested in City’s injured striker Alvaro Negredo. City would love to sell Negredo, giving them the financial flexibility they need to sign Falcao, but because of Negredo’s current injury, Valencia is only interested in paying around $30 million for a one year loan. $30 million isn’t enough to sign Falcao however, so City needs Valencia to take Negrado permanently if they want to sign Falcao.

As of Sunday evening, Valencia and Manchester City officials were still in discussions to get a deal done. Negredo has told Valencia that it is the desire of him and his family to return to Spain while Manchester City is hoping they can pull off the coup of the century and land Falcao. If City cannot work out a deal with Valencia for Negredo, look for Arsenal to swoop in and steal Falcao with Manchester United still having an outside chance.

Arsenal is looking to replace Oliver Giroud who broke his foot last week and after surgery is expected to be out until early 2015. Arsenal has a reputation of pulling off last second deadline day deals, signing Mesut Ozil and Andrey Arshavin on the final day in the recent past. Manchester United manager, Louis Van Gaal is apparently still hell bent on bringing in one more massive signing, despite acquiring Daley Blind on Sunday and Angel Di Maria earlier in the week. Look for Falcao’s future to come down to the last second on Monday as Mendes will wait until the last minute to extract as much money from teams has he can. All eyes will be on Falcao as he is the last big name star expected to be moved on Monday.