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Are Barcelona Really Interested In Celtic’s Wanted Man?

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The Juranovic transfer story took a bizarre new twist today when a new name emerged as an interested party; Barcelona. I read that and wondered, “Really?”

On the surface of it, the story seems a bit mad. Aren’t there … better options available to the Catalan super-club? In spite of their financial situation, are they really now shopping in the SPFL? Does that sound like a goer? Does that sound even remotely likely?

There are reasons why it could be. Which is what makes it truly mad.

For openers, those financial issues at Barcelona are severe. That puts them out of luck when it comes to signing the truly top bracket footballers. Secondly, this isn’t shopping in the SPFL: that’s the entirely wrong way to look at it.

No, this is “shopping at the World Cup” and that’s a different thing.

On top of that, Juranovic has been growing in stature and confidence for the whole of this tournament and his best performance, so far, was against Brazil and a player who Barcelona unfortunately know well (and so do we.) They might figure that if he can keep Vicinius Junior out at this level he might be worth the punt on.

The buzz around Juranovic has something of a self-fulfilling momentum. Rumours still link him to Atletico Madrid. I scoffed at those at the time (and the club denied it) but that those stories, so many of them, are in the air adds some weird credibility to these other crazy tales. It all increases his profile. The sense that there is active interest does weird things.

There is an illustrative story about what we should do next; in fact, there are two.

One we saw happen and another which we heard did.

The one we saw was on Sunderland Till I Die as their board, desperate for a striker, entered into a bizarre auction with themselves over Will Grigg. His club did not set them a fee.

They did nothing except refuse every transfer bid until finally Sunderland threw a crazy number at them.

Had his club named that price at the start negotiations would have ended quickly. They didn’t. They let Sunderland bid against the clock, and it worked like a charm.

A similar dynamic, on a much larger scale, played out when Leicester sold Harry Maguire to Manchester United for an obscene fortune which no-one can quite believe to this day.

They basically followed the same formula. They asked of United only one question; how much do you want him? And then they let that club get carried away finding the answer.

Remember; if one club is interested we’ve got a bid. Give them no encouragement.

If a second club is interested we have a bidding war between them and we should do nothing in that case either.

If there’s a third club interested you have an auction and then you wait to see whose need is greatest and whose intent is the most serious.

(Or you wait to see who’s most desperate or out of their minds.)

And we might now be on the brink of that.

If this Barcelona story has anything to it at all we might well be in the middle of one already.

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  • Roonsa says:

    It seems a bit sad that we think this way about a valued player at Celtic. Especially as he hasn’t been with us that long. I know we can talk about climate and knowing our place in the footballing world but even so. It does smack of Sevconian exuberance which is largely fed by our ridiculous media. Whatever happens happens. I know there’s not much chance of it but it would be great if he stayed.

  • Benjamin says:

    I would be surprised if Barcelona isn’t interested. If they have any intention of winning La Liga in the coming years, they need an answer to Vinicius Jr problem. Juranovic showed he’s up to the task, and that’s all that’s needed for Barcelona. The bigger question is how much can they afford given their financial constraints and will there be someone coming in with an even bigger offer recognizing that Barcelona may not have the funds.

  • Paul says:

    Your forgetting the player in your analysis. He might not want to go to a Chelsea or an EPL team & wants to go to Spain or he might prefer to stay at Parkhead and skelp sevco some more. We should give no club any encouragement

  • Johnny Green says:

    Sadly football is not just all about football, for it is also a self sustaining business and, apart from the Super clubs, no one can afford to turn down a healthy profit on any player. Jeremy Frimpong was sold for a lot of money and that was good piece of business at the time. it was money in the kitty which, with the money we got for Kris Ajer, probably helped towards Ange’s rebuild at the beginning of last season. What goes around comes around and I’m sure Ange will have his say here on the best way forward, and if he decides to cash in, then we must trust his judgement.

  • king murdy says:

    sell him on….any of them – if they want to go…let them and make a good profit…and plough it back into the team…
    NO-ONE is bigger than celtic…i am old enough to remember when paddy crerand went to man utd…”how are we gonna replace him” went the wail…..there was a certain bobby murdoch at the club….
    same with macari,hay and king kenny….celtic fc survived….and nowadays, even moreso…players come and go…and we will survive….
    fuq me…ange is gonna go….and we’ll survive..
    HH

  • Hans says:

    Er….no, they’re not. Well done for writing an entire article about a load of bollox.

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