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No Roma progress in bid to sign Leicester City's Riyad Mahrez - Monchi

Roma sporting director Monchi has said there has been no further movement in the club's attempts to sign Leicester playmaker Riyad Mahrez.

The Giallorossi are the only club to have made a bid for Algeria international Mahrez, who submitted a transfer request earlier this summer.

Leicester manager Craig Shakespeare has said the 26-year-old would prefer to stay in England, and Monchi told a news conference: "The situation with Mahrez has not changed.

"I would like to say a couple of things, though. A club like Roma, who can boast the calibre of players like [Lorenzo] Pellegrini, [Kevin] Strootman, [Radja] Nainggolan, [Edin] Dzeko, [Federico] Fazio or [Aleksandar] Kolarov, cannot think that their overall performance is going to depend on the arrival of just one specific right-winger.

"The guarantee comes from the route you are on and the group you have.

"The second message I wanted to give is that I don't know if Mahrez or somebody else will come but, whoever arrives, he will be a big player who is able to add quality to an already magnificent squad."

He said Roma would "prefer a left-footer, but it is the player's profile which counts," adding: "For the way the team play -- where the wide players tend to come inside -- a left-footer would be better, but it could also be a right-footer with natural tendencies to come inside.

"All the names that have been mentioned are interesting players and potential Roma targets, but the important thing is that I keep a certain degree of discretion in my work so I don't create confusion."

The sporting director also gave details of the players he expected to leave before the close of the window, saying: "We are looking for solutions for [Norbert] Gyomber, [William] Vainqueur, [Leandro] Castan and [Juan] Iturbe.

"We are close to a solution in some cases, whereas we are quite far away in others -- but there is still a month left."