During the winter break, FC Bayern signed Joao Cancelo, a player who FC Barcelona would have liked to have borrowed. However, the Catalans later claimed that Manchester City torpedoed the deal. Pep Guardiola now vehemently contradicts this representation.
“Xavi was not properly informed in this case,” Guardiola clarified in an interview with “AS” on Monday. The Barca boss previously claimed Man City didn’t let Cancelo join the Catalans.
“Man City discussed this internally and then told us that they don’t want to allow Joao to go to Barcelona,” said Xavi. According to Guardiola, this does not correspond to the facts.
“We decided that he had to go. And we didn’t care where he went,” emphasized the freshly crowned triple winner: “Nobody at City stopped him from going. I don’t know how things are now. But we have [im Winter] did not receive an offer from Barca for Cancelo.”
Xavi had previously presented this differently. Barca’s coach claimed that Cancelo was actively offered to his club: “And we agreed.” The fact that the change did not come about and the Portuguese ended up at Bayern instead caused displeasure among the Catalans.
FC Bayern does not want to commit Cancelo to a permanent contract
In the end, the deal between Cancelo, FC Bayern and Man City produced few winners. The full-back certainly knew how to impress in the jersey of the record champions, but he probably doesn’t have a future on Säbener Straße. As of today, Munich will not pay the fixed transfer fee of 70 million euros.
And so the Munich team have to look for a new full-back, ManCity for a new customer and Joao Cancelo for a new employer.