Any player Liverpool have shown any interest in these last six months, Tottenham are just behind them to begin with and usually finish in front. In the case of Luiz Adriano of Shakhtar Donetsk, the trendy team of the Champions League this season, Arsenal are also in the mix.
The 25 year old striker hasn’t scored a single goal for Shakhtar in the Champions League and isn’t a constant fixutre in the first team for them in the Ukranian league, but it seems the entire horde of Brazilians for the Ukrainian champions is a transfer target for big clubs after finally making the one imprint the gets people’s attentions in the Premier League: Playing and beating an EPL team, this time outclassing Chelsea in two matches, only to be unfortunate and lose the second one.
Premier League clubs don’t have the best of scouts in the world. Why pay them when you have enough money to compete with most of the other big clubs in Europe? Adriano and others playing for Shakhtar fly under the radar, even when playing in the Champions League, unless they happen to impress against a highly publicized club, like Chelsea, who are also showing interest in Willian.
Adriano and others aren’t usually in such a hurry to leave the Donbass Stadium due to the fact that Shakhtar pay them very well. Maybe not the best in the continent, but there are no signs of complaints from Mircea Lucescu’s players, most of them playing for the club since their teenage years.
Adriano himself is in his 7th season playing for Shakhtar, arriving at the age of 19 from Internacional in Brazil for €3 million. Since arriving in 2006 he has played in 170 matches, scoring 72 goals in all competitions. He has won the Premier League four times and the UEFA Cup one in 2009, scoring the opening goal in the 2-1 win over Werder Bremen.
Adriano hasn’t made an appearance for the Brazilian national team, and he probably won’t be leaving for anything less than €10-12 million, which might throw a “cheap” club like Arsenal off his trail.