Over the past 48 hours things have begun to move quickly on the Bradley Barcola front, with reports for the first time signalling Paris Saint-Germain are now open to selling the 23-year-old French international winger and that the player wants to change clubs. Soon after came claims from the English side that the Reds that were preparing to enter into formal negotiations with PSG for the player.
There remains the small matter of working out an acceptable transfer fee, with claims that PSG could be seeking anywhere between €120M and €170M for a player who a summer ago was rated at €85M when Liverpool first wanted to sign him, but last summer Barcola didn’t want out. Now he does. And according to the latest reliable reports out of France, he has given his go-ahead to joining the Reds.
According to L’Équipe’s Loic Tanzi, Barcola has spoken to Liverpool head coach Andoni Iraola and has given his agreement in principle to join up if a transfer can be arranged, with discussions accelerating after France exited the World Cup and personal terms believed to be largely sorted. The player being on board, though, won’t count for anything if a fee can’t be agreed with the Parisian sportswashers.
PSG’s valuation is said to be informed by the eyebrow-raising moves of Elliot Anderson to Manchester City and Morgan Rogers to Chelsea earlier this summer. Both, though, had longer contracts with their selling clubs and count as homegrown for squad registration purposes, and certainly Liverpool will be approaching the transfer negotiations with both of those factors front of mind.
