Atletico Madrid president Enrique Cerezo has left the door open for a potential move for Barcelona’s Antoine Griezmann, although he acknowledged that such a move would be extremely difficult to pull off.
Griezmann is for sale this summer when Barcelona look to drastically reduce the cost of signing Lionel Messi again, and the idea of a swap deal between the Frenchman and Atletico Madrid’s Saul Niguez gained momentum already during the month.
Negotiations between the two clubs were intense but ultimately fruitless, and Barcelona insisted that Atletico should pay a little extra money to write about Griezmann. But Los Rojiblancos had none of that and kept the talks waiting.
Today, the idea of a Griezmann / Saul replacement has cooled, but when he spoke to COPE, Cerezo acknowledged that there is still a possibility if the two sides can overcome the significant obstacles between them.
“We do not rule out anything, but what we can say is that it is not an easy signing,” Cerezo said. “We are waiting for news, not only from Griezmann, but from any player, but as I said, it is a difficult operation.”
Griezmann is believed to be keen to return to Atletico, with whom he blossomed into one of the game’s deadliest strikers before leaving Barcelona for a £ 107million-dollar contract in 2019, and manager Diego Simeone is personally pushing for the deal to be completed.
Barcelona are open to selling but are reluctant to take too big a loss on Griezmann, despite being literally desperate to cut their salary budgets to write about Messi.
Meanwhile, both players have been offered around Europe. Sources have confirmed for 90 minutes that Griezmann’s agent has spoken to a handful of Premier League teams, with Chelsea, Manchester City and Liverpool all aware of his availability.
Griezmann has been offered Premier League / Quality Sport Images / Getty Images
So far, the response to that offer has been minimal, while there has been great interest from England for Saul.
Alongside Chelsea and Liverpool, Manchester United are thought to be in contact with the 26-year-old’s agent to discuss the possibility of a summer transfer.
