Moroccan Star Adel Taarabt Rejects Saudi Move, Opts to Stay at Benfica

The Al Fateh club made a loan offer with a purchase option for Taarabt, which was accepted by the Portuguese club but firmly rejected by the player who would like to relaunch himself in Europe and at the same time keep his monthly salary of nearly 200,000 euros.

The Saudi club would have thus offered one million euros for one year with a purchase option at the end of this period. Adel Taarabt, who has not yet set foot on the pitch since the start of the season, will therefore have to stay until the end of the year waiting for a hypothetical transfer to a European club.

The player had arrived in Lisbon in 2015 but his behavior and media outings were not to the liking of the Benfica leaders. "Being sidelined like that, it made me blow a fuse. The president then organized a meeting between the coach and me. I told him that I didn’t understand, that I had still played at Milan, in the Champions League, in England for more than six years, I’m not a kid," the player had said in an interview, which greatly displeased the club president who swore never to line him up on the pitch again.