I believe there are truths to these Xabi rumors because they were in all sorts of press, not only Goal.com or La Gazzetta, but also Liverpool press and perhaps even Pool FC Television. It's pretty obvious we were after him.
Ranieri himself either didn't want him and chose Poulsen instead (which would just be absolutely retarded) or he's lying about this whole ordeal to save his ass or the boards', or perhaps Pool decided to keep him in the end because they realize he's actually a great asset. Either way, we were after Xabi.
I can't understand one thing Andy, if Ranieri would always pick Poulsen ahead of Xabi then:
Why Ranieri remained silent over a month of negotiation with Xabi?
Why did we waste all that time to figure out our real needs?
Why did Ranieri announce he picked Poulsen instead of Xabi for tactical reasons only days after the later negotiation collapse?
You wanna know why I'll tell you why, Poulsen was obviously a plan B, we fucked things up with Xabi and we couldn't reach an agreement as we always do, we needed a excuse so the board asked the man who think Juve is a tree to go to and do what he do best by telling us more of his horsecrap.