Zenit is interested in Palmeiras player Arthur, Brazilian media reported

The flagship of Russian football, Zenit, continues to be associated with the search for promising personnel on the Brazilian market. A number of sources reported that the club is interested in acquiring Palmeiras footballer Arthur, who two years ago joined the symbolic team of the Brazilian championship. It could cost the St. Petersburgers €18 million—domestic teams have not paid such large sums for players since the beginning of the special military operation.

Several Brazilian media resources, such as UOL, globo.com and others, reported that Zenit is interested in acquiring, possibly within the winter transfer window that opens in January, the 25-year-old Palmeiras player Arthur. They claim that his compatriot Claudinho, who plays for the St. Petersburg club, has already contacted the footballer. He was Artur’s team-mate at Bragantina before moving to St Petersburg in 2021 and is believed to see him as a good addition to the flagship of Russian football. Chairman of the Board of Zenit Alexander Medvedev, commenting on the information, called it “rumours”.

Estimating the cost of Arthur for St. Petersburg residents, sources indicate amounts in the range from €15 million to €18 million. If the deal goes through, it can be considered a great commercial success for Palmeiras. In this club, Arthur began his professional career in the previous decade, but then they parted with him. To bring the player back from Bragantina in March of this year, Palmeiras spent €8 million.

As for the Russian Premier League (RPL), by today’s standards the potential deal looks almost gigantic. The last player worth more than €15 million who came to the RPL was Brazilian forward Yuri Alberto, who was also acquired by Zenit in January 2022 from Corinthians, and had already left Russia. According to Transfermarkt, he cost the club, which won the last five Russian championships, €25 million. After the start of a special military operation in Ukraine and the subsequent strict international sanctions, domestic clubs sharply reduced transfer spending. During the summer window before the current season, their most expensive purchase was the one made by Dynamo. The cost of transferring Brazilian playmaker Bitellu to the Moscow team from Grêmio was allegedly €10 million.

At Palmeiras and Bragantina, Arthur was used in several positions in attack and midfield. But the main position for him was still the position of the right insider, who combines dispatcher functions with scorers. Another Brazilian, much more famous, previously played approximately the same role at Zenit. We are talking about the top scorer of the previous Russian championship, Malcolm, who was sold to Al-Hilal from Saudi Arabia for €60 million in August. Arthur has never been as productive (in 2023, he scored 13 goals in 55 official matches in different tournaments), but has a rather bright background. He played several matches for the Brazilian youth and youth teams and was even called up to the national team for training camp. And in 2021, Arthur was included in the symbolic team of the Brazilian championship.

This country has a special significance in the life of modern Zenit. At the turn of the last and current decades, he was constantly looking for personnel on the Brazilian market, and, as a rule, the finds turned out to be successful. In this championship, seven Brazilian footballers played for Zenit, not counting Mario Fernandez, who had long ago received Russian citizenship: Wendel, Claudinho, Douglas Santos, Rodrigao, Eduardo Queiroz, Gustava Mantuan, Robert Renan. The first four are among the key players of the team, for which the race for the sixth consecutive gold of the Russian Championship is still quite difficult. After the first round, Zenit is in second place in the table, two points behind Krasnodar.

Alexey Dospehov