Barcelona made an offer of €10 million for Italy forward but ‘could not afford to pay’ | OneFootball

As has already been well-established FC Barcelona were keenly interested in signing Federico Chiesa from Juventus in the past week before his move to Liverpool.

Having missed out on Nico Williams and not having a big budget to make a top signing, Barcelona focused their efforts on a move for Chiesa, who had fallen out of favour at Juventus.

Ultimately, though, the Italian winger ended up signing for Liverpool with Barcelona not being in a position to complete the deal because of their Financial Fair Play issues.

However, it has now emerged that Barcelona did make an offer to try and lure the winger to Catalonia.

The truth about Barcelona’s proposal for Chiesa

Indeed, according to SPORT, in the last few days of the market, Barça were very close to completing the deal that would have seen Federico Chiesa join the club.

Negotiations reached an advanced stage, and a three-year contract was even agreed with the player. However, the transfer was complicated due to the financial situation of the Catalan club.

Although for days everything seemed to indicate that the transfer was on hold as Barcelona were waiting to create enough salary space to sign him in La Liga, the reality was different.

Chiesa opted to join Liverpool. (Photo by Gabriele Maltinti/Getty Images)

As SPORT has learned, the problem was not only with Chiesa’s registration but with Barça’s lack of liquidity.

Barcelona had offered €10 million to Juventus for Chiesa, but could not afford to pay it. Deco, the club’s sporting director, went so far as to tell Juventus that they did not have the cash available to pay the amount.

Instead, they proposed to pay the €10 million in five years, in annual instalments to split the payment.

The proposal, however, was not accepted by Juventus, who were looking for immediate income and were unwilling to wait so long to receive the money.

Similarly, Chiesa, who had already agreed to make a financial effort to sign for the Blaugrana and give the club room to sign his contract, was not willing to sign for five years.

In the end, although Barça’s offer for Chiesa was real, financial constraints prevented the deal from going through. Juventus, who rejected deferred payments over five years, ended up accepting Liverpool’s proposal.