Having spent €200m on Griezmann and De Jong this summer,
Barcelona could not afford Neymar. But they will be back
By Adam White and Eric Devin for Get French
Football News
“Se queda,” “il reste” and “he stays” are words that have become synonymous with Neymar and the ever-swirling transfer circus that engulfs him, despite it never really being wholly true. Ten days after Gerard Piqué posted his famous “se queda” tweet in 2017, Neymar proved him wrong. Now, after a summer in which Barcelona tried to bring him back, he has stayed put in Paris.
Given the fanfare surrounding Neymar’s initial €222m arrival from Barcelona in 2017 – a moment the decision-makers at PSG saw as signalling a shift in the power base of European football as well as a huge PR triumph – the prospect of effectively conceding that the endeavour had ended in failure was more than unpalatable for the club. Yet, unusually for PSG under QSI ownership, the club have handled the undulating saga surprisingly deftly.