Barcelona are ready to turn to a former target in January if they can’t agree a fee for Man City’s Eric Garcia

Posted Friday, October 23, 2020 by Caughtoffside.com

It was recently reported by Marca that Barcelona’s squad was broken after the board tried to impose a 25% pay cut on them.

The majority of the players signed a letter informing those in charge that they wouldn’t give in, only for a few of them to break rank and sign new deals with a pay cut included.

Gerard Pique was among those to do that and it looks like he’s leveraged this situation to get himself a new long term deal when there’s no way he would get one otherwise.

Barca are clearly short of money and that’s why they are trying to do this, but it will be interesting to see how the players react if the club then go out and buy players in the January window.

There’s an argument that they might be pleased that the club is showing ambition, but they’ll probably be furious that they’ve given up money from their agreed contracts for this.

That puts a lot of pressure on anyone who comes in, and a report from Mundo Deportivo has indicated that a new centre back is a high priority.

They confirm that Barca are still hoping to find a way to take Eric Garcia from Man City, but they’ve decided to turn to former target Luiz Felipe as a back up option.

The Lazio centre back was heavily linked last January so there’s clearly interest there, but it’s hard to tell if this is genuine or just part of the game to convince City to part ways with Garcia.

Despite extending Pique’s deal until 2024 they still need to find the long term successor for him, but Eric Garcia does look like the best option to do that just now.