‘ELITE’ GABRI VEIGA MAY HAVE ALREADY RULED OUT £35M ARSENAL OR NEWCASTLE MOVE

And they say loyalty is dead.

A player of Iago Aspas’ talents deserves Champions League football. International honours. Silverware and success. Instead, with his 36th birthday approaching, Aspas looks increasingly likely to bow out of top-level football with only a Europa League winners’ medal from his time at Sevilla glittering alone in his echoing trophy cabinet.

Like Francesco Totti, Alan Shearer, Matt le Tissier and co, Aspas undoubtedly could – and arguably should – have so much more to show for his remarkable talents. But ask him if he regrets spending his best years at the Balaidos and he’ll respond with a resounding ‘no’.

Now, it’s Gabri Veiga’s turn to show that he, too, is willing to put the needs of the collective over the ambitions of the individual. How far does his loyalty stretch?

According to AS, Newcastle have sent scouts to watch one of La Liga’s most exciting breakout stars. Arsenal and Manchester United too. With a £35 million release clause in his contract, the decision on whether or not to stay to a leaf out of Aspas’ book and stay at his boyhood club – or seize the opportunity to play European football and fight for trophies elsewhere – could soon be Veiga’s and Veiga’s alone.

Veiga has taken to kissing his badge of late in a public show of devotion to his beloved Celta. Interest from the likes of Newcastle, Arsenal and Manchester United, however, will test his loyalty to it’s limits.

ARSENAL, NEWCASTLE AND MAN UNITED COULD TEST GABRI VEIGA’S LOYALTY
“I’m very happy,” 20-year-old Veiga told Le Voz de Galicia in February 2022. “Celta is my home. It is the club of my life. It is the place where I want to spend many years.”

With some of England’s biggest and most deep-pocketed club showing an interest, the prospect of Veiga leaving Celta Vigo – just 12 months after insisting that he wanted to ‘spend many years’ in baby blue – may have some remembering Wayne Rooney’s ‘Once a Blue, Always a Blue’ declaration, shortly before leaving Everton for Manchester United.

Beyond Aspas’ enduring brilliance, Celta supporters haven’t had too much to smile about in recent times. Veiga’s emergence, however, has raised hopes of a brighter future. A footballer of seemingly limitless potential; Veiga has marked his breakthrough La Liga season with three assists and a further eight goals.

From cheeky chips to long-range blunderbusses, Veiga could almost put on his very own Goal of the Season competition, such has been the exquisite quality of his finishing.

“He’s different,” Celta coach Carlos Carvalhal tells El Pais. “He has the ability to see when he has to break into the rival penalty box. He has a lot of confidence and, above all, great mental strength.

“When he went through a low point and had to be on the bench, he did not stop training as well as his body allowed, until he reached another level. Reaching the elite, as he is doing, is only within the reach of the privileged.”