Barcelona have reached a verbal agreement with Manchester City striker Sergio Aguero to bring him to Camp Nou on a two-year deal this summer.
Aguero is out of contract at the end of the season and is towards the top of Barcelona’s wish list, with new president Joan Laporta keen to reunite him with international teammate Lionel Messi at club level.
Reports of a ‘formal offer’ to Aguero emerged last week, and now AS state that an agreement has been reached over a two-year contract for the 32-year-old, who could follow City star Eric Garcia to Barca.
Aguero is said to be ‘very close’ to sealing the move, although his contract has not been signed just yet because Laporta has not yet taken over as president. Carlos Tusquets is still in charge for the time being and he will not finalise any deals himself.
On top of Laporta’s arrival, it’s also suggested that Aguero’s future could be in Messi’s hands. Seen partly as a tactic to keep Messi happy at the club, the report claims that the 33-year-old may be given the final say over whether Aguero signs or not.
Signing Aguero would likely force Laporta to give up on his dream of rebuilding the squad around Borussia Dortmund’s Erling Haaland, whose value of well over £100m makes a move to Barcelona seem more than a little unlikely anyway.
Instead, Aguero would become the starting striker at Camp Nou, and AS make a point of telling us that he’d be a bit of an upgrade on current frontman Martin Braithwaite. In other breaking news, water is wet.
Talks over which striker to pursue are expected to continue behind the scenes. If Laporta can’t have Haaland, he wants Aguero, but manager Ronald Koeman still has his heart set on Lyon’s Memphis Depay (whose name you can’t write on Twitter these days, apparently).
An agreement was reached with Depay last summer and the Dutchman was expected to make the move to Camp Nou before the start of this season, but Barca’s inability to free up a space in the squad meant they had to postpone the move.
Laporta has other priorities, but with the signing of Aguero not yet closed, he is considering all his options.