But first, Hautekiet had to help SL16 FC stay in the Challenger Pro League. The goal is for the 20-year-old Belgian to join Ronny Deila’s core A and evolve with that of Joseph Laumann. Initially, Club Brugge demanded €1m for their player who still had a year and a half on his contract. An amount too high for the people of Liège. After some negotiations, things seemed to be back to normal. Hautekiet had even refused to play Club NXT’s last match last weekend, determined that he was to join Standard.
Bruges tried to derail the deal
But despite the approach of an agreement and the clear desire of his player to join the banks of the Meuse where he felt he had more chances of breaking through, Club Brugge has, in recent times, done everything to ensure that the deal does not come true requiring too large a sum. Upon arrival, the player, who really wants to play for Standard, had to make a financial effort in his salary to fill the gap between the requests from Bruges and the offer from Liège. Also, it comes down to us that the Bruges management would have informed OHL of the entire negotiations so that the player could sign at Den Dreef where he should not have consented to a salary effort.
But in the end, Ibe Hautekiet is well in the offices of the Sclessin stadium this Tuesday evening to confirm his move to Standard where negotiations are still in progress for an attacker at the end of the transfer window.