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The preparation of Madrid for the upcoming season is continuing at a furious pace - just a week ago, the capital city club announced their new head coach and on Monday officially confirmed the acquisition of Argentine wonderkid Sergio Aguero, Portuguese defenders Zé Castro and Mariano Pernía, while on Tuesday they announced the purchase of Greek Giourkas Seitaridis from Moscow and Portuguese Costinha.
One of the most promising Argentine players, 17-year-old S. Aguero, who won the World Cup with his country's youth team (under 20) last year and scored 18 goals in 36 matches in the 2005/06 season back home, signed a six-year contract with "Atletico". The "Independiente" club should receive around 16 million euros for him.
23-year-old Portuguese youth national team defender Z. Castro from "Académica" is moving to Madrid as a free agent, while M. Pernía, a 29-year-old defender who was a revelation in the Spanish championship, cost "Atletico" 4 million euros and included the rights to 22-year-old country's youth national team striker Manuel del Moral.
Just a day later, "Atletico" announced the acquisition of two more players - 24-year-old Greek national team defender G. Seitaridis and 31-year-old former Portuguese midfielder Costinha signed a four-year contract with the club. Both players moved from "Porto" to Moscow's "Dynamo" two years ago, but failed to settle in Russia and have now returned to Western Europe. The financial details of the deal are undisclosed.
