In the 1/8 final of the Spanish Copa del Rey, Barca will go to the away game to challenge Athletic Bilbao, barca announced the big list, The French star Dembele lost, and the official explanation given by Barca is "technical reasons". At yesterday's pre-match press conference, Barca coach Xavi said Dembele would either renew his contract with the team or leave Barca in the winter transfer window. It is clear from Xavi that Dembele's defeat was not due to injury, but because of the stalemate in his contract extension with Barca.
Following Xavi's ultimatum to Dembele, Barca's superintendent Alemani also confirmed Dembele's situation. Alemani said Barca and Dembele and his agent have been in dialogue since last July and we have offered different offers several times over the past seven months in the hope that the players will renew their contracts with the club, but these offers have been rejected by the players and in our opinion the players do not want to stay at Barca.
Now with 11 days to go until the last transfer window when the player's contract expires, we have informed him and his agent that they must leave the squad as soon as possible, we want loyal players, and Dembele is obviously not such a player, said Barca director Alemani. Barca excluded Dembele from the tournament squad for contract renewal, and Barca's actions were opposed by the Spanish players' union.
The Spanish players' union said that the renewal of the contract between the team and the players requires both parties to be voluntary, and there should be no pressure on one party to the other. Although Dembele cannot decide whether to play or not, Barca's behavior can now be understood as putting pressure on Dembele. The players' union has called on Barca not to harm the interests of their players, because if a player is unable to play for a long time without injuries, his level of competition will decline, which will affect the future of the player.
According to the Spanish media "Daily Sports", in the face of Barca's "blockade", Dembele himself is very calm, and he still plans to wait until the summer to leave Barca freely. Dembele's team believes that if they go to FIFA to sue Barca, they will definitely win, in fact, Barca did not dare to use the term "block", but used "technical reasons" to prevent Dembele from playing.
Dembele moved from Borussia Dortmund to Barca in the summer of 2017, where Barca spent a fixed transfer fee of €105 million + a floating transfer fee of €40 million, totaling €145 million, spending more than half of the €220 million from the sale of Neymar. In the past few seasons for Barca, Dembele has been injured, but Xavi still wants to focus on cultivating Dembele after coaching Barca, because Barca are really unavailable now.
When Xavi first took charge of Barca, he saw Dembele as the core of the future team. At that time, Dembele also expressed his willingness to stay in Barca on social media and was willing to play under Xavi, and Barca officials also said that the renewal negotiations with Dembele were very smooth. Later, the situation reversed, and many Spanish media broke the news that Dembele asked Barca for an annual salary of 40 million euros, which was obviously unsatisfactory to Barca, so the negotiations between the two sides broke down.
Barca saw no hope of renewing Dembele's contract and wanted to sell the players in the winter transfer window in order to recover some of the transfer fees, after all, it cost 145 million euros. Dembele wanted to wait until the summer free transfer to get a large signing fee and a high salary from the new owner, and both sides had their own calculations, so now the two sides are making a bit of a lot of trouble.
Barca issued an eviction order, but Dembele just couldn't leave, Barca had no way to do anything, the only thing they could do was not let the players play. At this time, if there is a team to offer Dembele and can convince Dembele to transfer, then Barca will certainly be grateful. According to journalist Almeida, Chelsea are interested in barca's €15 million bid for Dembele and want to sign him at the winter transfer window.
Although Chelsea signed Lukaku last summer, Lukaku did not play at the same level as at Inter Milan after joining, and after Lukaku expressed his dissatisfaction with the status quo, Chelsea wanted to bring in a new striker. While Chelsea want Haaland most, the competition to buy Haaland is not small, and it would be a good choice if they could now bring in a young and powerful striker for 15 million euros.
Dembele did well at Borussia Dortmund, and although he was injured after coming to Barca, he always created some surprises on the field and could also make people see his level of competition. Although Chelsea's offer of 15 million euros is a little less, if Dembele can really transfer, Barca will still be grateful to Chelsea, after all, recovering 15 million euros is better than not getting a penny in the summer. If Dembele were to move to Chelsea for a transfer fee of 15 million euros, Barca would lose as much as 130 million euros.
Newcastle in the Premier League has always been interested in Dembele, but the Premier League tycoon wants to sign Dembele in the summer. According to the media, Newcastle has prepared a signing fee of 20 million euros and an annual salary of 15 million euros for Dembele. Chelsea's annual salary for Lukaku is 14 million euros, so if Dembele is willing to transfer, Chelsea can also provide an annual salary of 15 million euros, of course, all depends on Dembele's personal wishes.