Danish media have referred to transfer specialist Fabrizio Romano as a potential crucial figure in a developing transfer scandal.
One of Europe’s most talked-about young prospects is Roony Bardghji, a young player for Copenhagen. His goal against Manchester United in the group round of the Champions League earlier this season was a major turning point in his career.
Unfortunately, the 18-year-old Swede has been missing from Copenhagen’s first squad since the beginning of the year. It is well-known that Bardghji’s present contract with Copenhagen will expire in 2025. Yet, as of yet, there has been no official word about a new contract.
The 18-year-old’s name has come up in connection with potential clubs like Barcelona and Manchester United. But up to this point, such connections have yielded zero results.
During Monday night’s match against Nordsjalland, fans couldn’t help but chant the player’s name. But once again, the team’s leading scorer from the first half of the season did not get any playing time.
Earlier this week, Romano informed his large fan base that, due to a contract dispute, Copenhagen was excluding their star player from first-team consideration.
“Roony Bardghji, strange case for one of best talents in Europe. From being top scorer with 10 goals for Copenhagen to… zero minutes in first games of 2024.
“Reason is that Bardghji has no intention to sign new long-term deal — from the summer, he will only have 18 months left on his contract with several top clubs monitoring him,” Romano posted on social media.
Nevertheless, Copenhagen flatly denied the information reported by the Italian journalist. As a result, Romano and his transfer team became the subjects of a dramatic investigation in Danish media. Troels Bager Thogersen, an editor at Tipsbladet, made a shocking claim against Romano and his team.
He says they have tried to negotiate sponsorship arrangements with soccer teams. Clubs would pay for mentions on Romano’s social media accounts. Furthermore, he made it clear that the player’s representatives had planted the Bardghji narrative.
“I know that Fabrizio Romano is hailed like a god on social media. I just have to say that very often he gets his information from player agents and turns out to be the mouthpiece of their agenda,” Thogersen said.
“For this specific case, it very much looks like the entourage of the player wants to send out a message to put pressure on FC Copenhagen. This can’t be seen as journalism.
“It is a business where clubs and agents will need to pay for the publicity, and that can never be labeled as journalism. And I think that should be the lesson here. What might look like journalism are instead driven by pure commercial interests.”
So far, Romano has turned down an interview request from the Danish magazine. At the age of 31, the Italian has surpassed all other soccer journalists in terms of global fame. Twenty million people follow him on X (previously Twitter), two million people follow him on YouTube, and 27 million people follow him on Instagram.
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