By Gareth James
Cardiff City have been accused of making ‘disgusting’ offer for Crewe Alexandra skipper Perry Ng.
Bluebirds boss Neil Harris confirmed on Thursday that the club had looked at the player given the need for a right-back but no bid had yet been made.
But Crewe boss Dave Artell has claimed City have made an offer for 24-year-old Ng – and they are not happy about it.
“The offer that Cardiff made, I am not even sure, I think we have responded just to be polite,” Artell said.
“It didn’t warrant a response – it was that derisory. It was disgusting.
“It’s come about through an agent that’s not his agent trying to stick his nose in, trying to force a deal, trying to engineer a deal.
“It’s like, you don’t understand. If you think that’s going to get the deal over the line, you are miles away – like between here and Mars away.
“It is nothing to do with Perry or his agent and he was fuming yesterday when he saw what was going on.
Pez and his agent understood the situation and he just gets on with it. He is a terrific captain and player.
Harris wants three signings in the transfer window and a right-back is a priority given the injury to Arsenal loanee Jordi Osei-Tutu.
But it looks like Crewe are ready to play hard-ball over the player with Artell insisting the League One club are content to let his contract – which expires this summer – run down.
“I am not surprised that we have seen press speculation about our players because we have good players and that just isn’t Pez,” added Artell.
“Firstly, we do not need to sell. We are in a good financial position, probably the best we have been for a number of years, so we are in a strong position there.
“If he stays and runs his contract down and goes in the summer then that is what happens.
“He wants to stay, I’m sure we will sit down and talk about it, but he knows that we won’t consider offers like the one we received this week. It was absolutely derisory.”
City travel to Nottingham Forest tomorrow for the FA Cup third-round tie also without injured centre-half and skipper Sean Morrison.