Juventus have denied reports they have made a daring bid to take David Villa to Italy.
A report in El Comercio on Saturday claimed the Serie A giants had turned their attention to the Barcelona striker after reaching an impasse in their efforts to sign Fernando Llorente from Athletic Bilbao.
Juve are understood to be willing to pay no more than €20m for Llorente but the Basques refuse to release him for less than the €36m buy-out clause in his contract.
However, the Turin club’s director general Beppe Marotta has moved to dismiss the notion they want to bring Villa to the club as an alternative.
“I can rule out any interest or negotiations for David Villa,” he told Mundo Deportivo.
“He is a great player, but not the type we are looking for. We want a striker in the style of Edinson Cavani or Llorente, who are our primary targets along with Edin Dzeko.”
Villa, 30, has just returned from a long injury lay-off which forced him to miss Euro 2012 and it was rumoured Juventus were offering a four-year contract worth €8m per season.
