Ronaldinho is becoming a major problem (2)

Last week's incidents (read more in the first part of this contribution) seem a public expression of the deteriorated relations between Ronaldinho and Barcelona.

Catalan sports paper Sport claimed last week that the tecnical staff would have lost patience with Ronaldinho's unprofessional behaviour. Manager Frank Rijkaard's statements during a Saturday press conference, in which he didn't defend the player anymore - like he used to do before - against critical questions, seemed to confirm this. Although Rijkaard changed his tone again after last night's win over Valladolid: "Ronaldinho didn't let me down, I'm with him. I cannot be disappointed with him, since he has gven a lot to the club and the team."

Different sources have been reporting that the Barcelona board has taken the decison to listen to offers coming in for the player. Catalan sports paper El Mundo Deportivo even says that some board members think the Brazilian shouldn't play ever again for the club. Madrid tabloid As claims that especially Barcelona president Joan Laporta is fed up with the player and is constantly trying to leak stories to the press, aiming to discredit the player and make it that way possible to sell Ronaldinho, without too much critical comments from the fans, as soon as an interested club comes knocking.

But the latter seems a problem. Catalan sports site Info Esports claims that of course no club is willing to pay the 125 million euro (°) buyout clause, but that no club is at this moment even considering to negotiate with Barcelona about a transfer. And the three main candidates to transfer Ronaldinho - Chelsea, AC Milan and Inter Milan - indeed seem to have stopped their efforts to bring in the player, like all three have explicitly admitted in the last weeks (read more here, here and here).

(this is the second part of this contribution, the first part was published earlier today, the third and last part will be published tomorrow)