Erling-Braut Haaland’s next club is the transfer saga that will not go away. His minimum fee release clause of €69m only becomes active next summer, but elite clubs are circling, hoping to maybe pay a premium but to sign him a year earlier than that. His agent, Mino Raiola and his father, ex Manchester City and Leeds United midfielder Alfe-Inge have been touring Europe and having meetings with top clubs, eager to strum up interest for Erling.
There is also news of Lionel Messi, making demands to the new president of Barcelona on what he wants as assurances of before he signs a new contract.
Both of the players have made it very clear what they want, and it is up to the clubs, if they want them enough, to make adjustments to meet their demands if they want the players to play ball.
Let’s start with Haaland. His agent and father have held meetings with both Barcelona and Real Madrid, and will be meeting four English clubs in the coming week. The clubs in question are believed to be both Manchester clubs along with Chelsea and Liverpool. One of Lionel Messi’s demands are that Barcelona sign a new marquee signing. His preference is his countryman, Sergio Aguero on a free transfer, but it is believed that the Barcelona board want to bring in Erling Haaland. Surely that is a compromise that Lionel will be happy to make if the Catalan club can pull it off.
Raiola and Alfe-Inge Haaland also held a long meeting with Real Madrid, and there was an interesting point made about what Erling would want to happen if he was to sign for the Madrid club. Erling would really like to line up alongside his international teammate Martin Odegaard. Real head coach Zinedine Zidance has used Odegaard extremely sparingly, with the Norwegian maestro only featuring 9 times for Real. With Haaland apparently desperate to share a dressing room with his international teammate could be a key factor in his decision and would come as a big blow to Arsenal, who are hoping to sign him permanently when his loan comes to an end at the Emirates.
Lionel Messi has also made demands of his own which he insists are key to him signing a new contact at Barcelona. As already stated, Lionel wants the club to sign a new marquee signing, in the shape of either Aguero or Haaland. He is also adamant that the club should not be signing anyone that will stand in the way of any of the La Masia graduates’ way to the first team as he is a firm believer in the academy graduates coming through the door, such as Ansi Fati and Iliax Moriba (who is currently being considered as an alternative to signing Liverpool Dutch international, Gini Wijnaldum). Messi has a lot of faith in the academy graduates and doesn’t want any players signed to get in their way. His final demand is that he gets his own private line to speak to the president, Joan Laporta, and is given the heads up on any decisions that are being made about the club and their direction.
It is quite a list of demands, and with the club recently announcing debts of over £1 billion, it will be interesting if they can offer a contract to Messi that he feels is worthy of his talent and contribution and also attract a marquee talent such as Haaland or Aguero, who both would likely insist on salaries no less than £250k per week. Let’s just see how this unfolds.