Brighton bid €40m for Charalampos Kostoulas, talks ongoing with Olympiacos
Brighton & Hove Albion have bid €40million (£34m; $45.6m) for Olympiacos striker Charalampos Kostoulas.
Brighton are in ongoing negotiations with the Greek Super League club after The Athletic revealed on May 16 that they had submitted an offer of around £30m plus Abdallah Sima for the 18-year-old, who is regarded as one of the hottest young talents in Europe.
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Olympiacos rejected the proposal involving Sima, 23, who has been loaned out by Brighton to French sides Brest and Angers, as well as Glasgow Rangers and Stoke City, since joining from Slavia Prague in 2021. The Greek side want a sell-on included in any deal.
Kostoulas helped Olympiacos to win the youth version of the Champions League in 2023-24 with five goals in eight appearances. He featured regularly for the first team in the Greek Super League and in the Europa League this season, with seven goals and two assists in 30 appearances combined across the two competitions.
Kostoulas was ruled out towards the end of the season by a muscle injury as Olympiacos won their domestic title. That success has gained Olympiacos entry to the league phase of the 2025-26 Champions League as the club with the best coefficient of domestic champions of national associations ranked 11 to 55 by UEFA, based on performances in European competitions over the past five years. Kostoulas has also scored five goals in 15 appearances representing Greece in age groups from under-16 to under-21.
Brighton have already signed a teenage striker from Greece for next season. Stefanos Tzimas, 19, was bought at the end of the January window for a fee in excess of £20m and loaned back to Nurnberg in Germany's second tier for the rest of the campaign.
The pool of central strikers Brighton head coach Fabian Hurzeler will have at his disposal in 2025-26 is in a state of flux. The German relied heavily on 34-year-old Danny Welbeck in the latter stages of his first season in charge, with Joao Pedro left out of the final two matches in May for disciplinary reasons, Evan Ferguson loaned out to West Ham, Julio Enciso on loan to Ipswich and Georginio Rutter injured.
Joao Pedro's future is uncertain after The Athletic revealed the Brazilian's omission from the squad by Hurzeler following an altercation in training with team-mate Jan Paul van Hecke. Welbeck, Joao Pedro and Kaoru Mitoma were the club's joint top scorers in the Premier League on ten goals as Brighton finished eighth, missing out on qualifying for Europe.
(Angelos Tzortzinis/AFP via Getty Images)
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