It would appear Barcelona’s hopes of securing a world class talent this summer are in tatters, and that’s according to Spanish football expert, Guillem Balague.
It’s long been contended that Neymar wants to return to the Camp Nou from Paris Saint Germain, with the Evening Standard noting, in quotes attributed to former president, Sandro Rosell, that Lionel Messi would love the chance to link up with his former team-mate again.
In a separate report, a figure of €164m is quoted as being the price it will cost Barca to re-sign the Brazilian.
“For this season he has a price set by FIFA, a percentage value of the 222 million that was paid. Now, Neymar costs 164 million euros,” Wagner Ribeiro, Neymar’s agent, said in an interview with ESPN Brazil’s Canal do Nicola and cited in the Evening Standard .
Despite this, Balague has poured cold water on the transfer, suggesting that there’s no way a deal will be made this summer. “Neymar is an impossibility, that’s just simply not going to happen,” he said on his YouTube channel, and cited by the Daily Star.
With football clubs likely to take a huge hit financially because of the coronavirus pandemic, it’s unlikely that any other club will be willing or able to stump up the money to acquire Neymar, so he appears destined to spend another season at least in the French capital.