Messi-led Argentina national team to play in Kerala next year
World Cup-winning Argentinian football team led by iconic Lionel Messi will play in Kochi next year, Kerala State Sports Minister V Abdurahiman announced on Wednesday.
If reports are to be believed, La Liga side Barcelona, are all set to sell midfielders Ivan Rakitic and Philippe Coutinho in this summer. Barcelona will do this because they need to balance their books to comply with FIFA’s Financial Fair Play (FFP) terms and conditions.
Initially, it was reported that that the Catalans were in extreme shortage of money, especially post their recent €120 million transfer of Antoine Griezmann.
It was also claimed that most of Barcelona’s star players including Lionel Messi were paid a few days later than usual.
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Now, keeping in mind their financial crisis, Barcelona might sell a few players to have some kind of stability in their finances.
According to Sports.es, Rakitic and Coutinho are the biggest names in the list.
The Catalans have a few big names as far as the midfield is concerned including players like Sergio Busquests and Arturo Vidal in the senior set of players and footballers like Arthur Melo, Carles Alena as youngsters.
This means players like Rakitic and Coutinho are actually surplus to the needs of the club at the moment. Their ordinary form in the last season might also work against them.
As per Sports.es, Barcelona has valued Coutinho at €100million. Rakitic, meanwhile, has been valued at €50million.
Coutinho was part of Brazil’s Copa America winning campaign and is likely to part ways with Barcelona to allow them to get funds to rope in Neymar, who is also expected to make a comeback to his former team.
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