11 Aug 2014
Barcelona have claimed that they managed to secure the signing of Luis Suarez within a few weeks of negotiation because they had started talks with the player even before the World Cup. Suarez recently completed a £ 75 million transfer to the camp Nou, thus becoming the third most expensive player in the world. He is only behind Gareth Bale and Cristiano Ronaldo in terms of costing their clubs more money. Suarez was banned for four months after biting Italy defender Giorgio Chiellini at the World Cup. However, this ban seemed to have little impact on the proposed to transfer to Barcelona and it proved to be the case.
Barcelona reportedly forced the player into making a public apology, as they tried to build on this image. Now, president Josep Bartomeu has admitted that they had been in talks with the player several months before the World Cup. The revelation of tapping up is unlikely to cause a huge problem since Liverpool do not seem interested in taking the case any further. The £ 75 million sale has enabled the Premier League club to strengthen the squad massively in several areas of the pitch. Bartomeu says that it was easy to convince Suarez that a move to Barcelona, and not Madrid, was not right one for him.
“When we approached Suárez, it was before the World Cup. We told him that he had the right age. He had the experience. Playing at Liverpool gave him incredible performances and it was the right time for him to come to our club, to Barcelona. We knew from of lot of years ago that Luis Suárez likes our club, likes our city. And we have the advantage – his agent is Pep Guardiola’s brother. He’s from Barça in his heart, also, so everything was perfect and created the perfect atmosphere that Luis Suárez accepted,” said the Barcelona president.