Catalan sports paper El Mundo Deportivo claims that Manchester United central defender Gerard Piqué (21) underwent a medical check-up in Barcelona yesterday morning.
An agreement between Barcelona and Piqué has been reached (read more here) and the deal with Manchester will soon be finalized, although the negotiations has been cancelled to not disturb the preparation of the club for the Champions League final on Wednesday. Barcelona would want to present Piqué soon after the final.
Catalan sports paper Sport claims that Barcelona is preparing a bid of 8 million euro° for Piqué, whose contract with the English champions expires next year. Barcelona sports vice president Marc Ingla and Barcelona sports director Txiki Begiristain will travel to Moscow this week and could there hold new and final talks with Manchester United officials.
Madrid sports tabloid As claims that there is a basic agreement that has been negotiated between Barcelona sports director Txiki Begiristain and Arturo Canales, the agent of the player and representative of sports marketing agency IMG that represnts the player since he was fifteen years old. Piqué would have rejected an offer from Juventus that was financially more interesting for him. A person from his entourage is quoted as saying: "He would swim back to Barcelona."
Piqué is the grandson of Amador Bernabéu, who was a Barcelona board member for twenty years (and even vice-president for a while) under presidents Josep Lluís Núñez and Joan Gaspart. Bernabéu said earlier this week in an interview with Catalan radio station Ona FM that Piqué is delighted to be linked with Barcelona: "Gerard will always give priority to Barcelona. His dream is to return. And he deserves it, as a person and as a player. He learned a lot since he left in 2004. And while playing on loan at Zaragoza he showed what he's capable of, he made a great pair with Milito that season."
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10 comments:
° 8 million euro =
13 million us dollar
6,5 million british pound
8million is too much. i'm afraid there are bad times ahead of us..
I doesn't look good. who barça is going to buy for wich price. And who barça is going to sell for wich price. it is starting to get ridiculous..
jordy
A top club always has to spend far more than they receive (unless you have some lucky shot like Milan selling Sevchenko to Chelsea).
I think 6-8 million euro is a good price for Piqué. You cannot expect Barça to pick up some central defender for 3-4 million euro.
What it boils down to is that your making a sizeable investment up front, expecting that you will yeild a greater return in the long term. In other words, he's only 21, he's definitely a more experienced player than when he left Barcelona in '04, and a more mature person as a whole being a teenager when he left. Oh, and did I mention he's a "favoured son"? And with that kind of money invested in him you can be sure that he's bound to get much more playing time and opportunity here than if he was to remain at Man U. So not only is it a good career decision for him, but in the long run Barcelona should also be able to reap the windfall for he "could" be well worth two, three, or four times the price Barcelona paid for him in the first place.
YAY YAY YAAAAY ! A sensible purchase!... to those who think 8 million euros is too much for a STARTING CENTRAL DEFENDer please stop being ridiculous
I wouldn't pay 1 euro for him. To develop players in La Masia, then see them leave for free and after a couple of years the club has to pay for the player they once developed. Pathetic!
This is a REALLY good singing, stop beaing stupid. The price is tooo low!
marc? what's the deal? a why start calling names. I think this is a place for opinions about barça?
jordy
to your point jordy my opinion of your opinion is that its a bit silly.. 8 million euros is low for a player who is ready to start in the middle of a defence for a top team for years to come! I do agree with the commenter before that it is terrible that we developed him and now we have to buy him back..but both the kid and the club are at fault for this. His development should have been made a priority for the club.. not everyday we produce a quality defender.. the cantera is full of messi's ( thaer the dos santos brothers etc etc.) and also shame on pique for bitting the nipple that nursed him.
The fee that was mentioned before was 5 million euro, so let's see where we'll end up.
I think it's a decent price. It of course doesn't feel totally right you have to pay now for a kid you raised yourself.
But on the other hand:
1. if you will have to go after another central defender, you'll have to pay even more (guys like Garay and Coloccini are probably somewhere between 10 and 15 million euro, not even to mention Chivu)
2. he gained a lot of experience in those four years (trained at top level, got to know another top competition, played CL, played a year on loan in Zaragoza) that we now can take advantage of (without having paid his salary for the last four years)
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