Lecce rejected chance to sign Roma superkid Lamela for chump change

Lecce had the chance of signing Erik Lamela before the Argie's move to AS Roma this season, it has been revealed.

Pedro Pasculli, who spent seven years across the late 1980s playing for Lecce and was a part of Argentina’s World Cup-winning squad in 1986, recommended the teen to the Serie A minnows.

“About three years ago during a trip to Argentina I noticed the young Lamela at River Plate and his qualities impressed me immediately.

“He was on the first team list at 16 and within a year - at 17 - had made his debut in the Primera Division. There, the boys are thrown immediately into the fray, but he had forged ahead in the youth side and you could see he had talent to burn.

“My first thought was to Lecce to suggest a deal.”

Speaking to Corriere del Mezzogiorno, the 51-year-old former forward revealed the Giallorossi were less than responsive to his suggestion.

“ [I met] with [then] sporting director [Guido] Angelozzi and chief executive Claudio Fenucci. To them I swore of the potential qualities of the boy.

“They listened but did not attach importance to what I had said. They nodded, showed a slight interest, but I quickly realised that they had no intention of following up the matter.

“And at a very low cost of a few hundred thousand dollars.

When asked why he felt the club were reluctant, Pasculli indicated that despite the examples of Mirko Vucinic and Valeri Bojinov, that the club had changed policy with youth development.

“They would have had to go to Argentina to see the boy, initiate negotiations with River, invest in a youngster and obviously they did not feel like it. Since [Vucinic and Bojinov] they have changed their mind.

“Roma paid €17m but they took him when he was already famous within the country. With Lecce he would have cost a lot less.”