Neymar might be headed back to FC Barcelona after all. Sources have told ESPN FC the club is set to offer to sign Neymar on loan from Paris Saint-Germain, with an option to make the deal permanent next week. Barcelona plans to make the offer this week.
The club had hoped to include Philippe Coutinho in a potential Neymar deal with PSG, but he wound up completing a deal to join Bayern Munich on Monday. Coutinho will be loaned to Bayern for €8.5 million, and the German club has an option to buy him outright for €120 million next summer.
Essentially, Barca will be copying Bayern’s strategy, proposing to take Neymar on this year, but with the option to buy his services outright after the season.
Neymar left Barcelona for PSG in 2017 for a world-record transfer fee of €222 million.
Barcelona simply doesn’t have the money to buy Neymar outright at the moment. This summer, the club has added Antoine Griezmann, Frenkie de Jong, Junior Firpo and Neto all for more than €200 million. This is all why Barca was desperate to unload a player like Coutinho in order to get a deal done for Neymar. Without moving some assets there’s no way a deal could get done.
The initial offer from Barca for Neymar was €80 million plus Coutinho and Ivan Rakitic. PSG countered by asking for €120 million, Coutinho and Nelson Semedo. The two sides were nowhere near being on the same page.
This loan deal makes a lot of sense. Neymar wants out of PSG, the club doesn’t want to pay his wages and Barcelona doesn’t have the cash on-hand to buy him right now.
We’ll see if the two sides can agree and get it done.
