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Real decide not to sell James to Atletico as the player returns to training with Los Blancos

Real decide not to sell James to Atletico as the player returns to training with Los Blancos

Real Madrid have decided not to sell playmaker James Rodriguez to city rivals Atletico Madrid. The decision was taken after Los Blancos suffered a 7-3 thrashing against Atleti in a pre-season friendly.

After such a humiliating result, it is believed that club President Florentino Perez has decided not to go ahead with the meeting with Atletico representatives in the United States as he does not want to strengthen his cross-city rivals.

The move will be a setback to Los Rojiblancos as they were extremely confident of bringing a quality player in the ongoing transfer window.

However, it is not clear what will this mean for Rodriguez as he was informed by manager Zinedine Zidane that he is not in his plans for next season.

In the back ground, there is Napoli as well who are still trying to push for a two-year loan deal for the former AS Monaco attacker with an option to buy in the future.

Update (20H00): James Rodriguez returned to training with Real Madrid as a move does not seem to be imminent anymore.