A Spanish journalist has come out to claim that Barcelona missed the chance to swap Arda Turan for Bernardo Silva in 2017.
Barcelona are most famous for their transfer dealings in the past few years rather than what they have achieved on the pitch. The club has signed the likes of Ousmane Dembele, Philippe Coutinho, and Antoine Griezmann for enormous amounts of money and all signings have tanked spectacularly.
Prior to the big-money signings of the three listed above, the club signed the likes of Arda Turan, Andre Gomes, Denis Suarez and many others who also flopped wearing the Blaugrana.
All of the signings have come with reports that the club passed up on signings that could have made a difference for the club. One of such signings is Kylian Mbappe, who has gone on to become one of the world’s best players and is now destined for a move to their El Clasico rivals Real Madrid in the summer.
Now, fresh reports from journalist Francesc Aguilar claim that Barcelona had a great chance to swap Arda Turan for Bernardo Silva in 2017.
Aguilar reports that Barcelona preferred to hold on to the former Atlético de Madrid ace with the hopes of selling him to China for big money instead of swapping him with Bernardo Silva.
Despite receiving offers from China for the former Turkish International, Turan refused to move to the Chinese Super League and ended up staying one more season before returning to Istanbul Basaksehir in Turkey on loan.
Bernardo Silva flourishing in Manchester City
Aguilar reports that Barcelona had offers in the range of €30 million for Turan from China which led them to ignore the swap deal AS Monaco – Silva’s club at the time – were offering.
Manchester City picked up on the deal and signed the Portuguese international in 2017. He has since risen to great heights under Pep Guardiola’s tutelage, winning major trophies along the way.
This season, while the rest of the Manchester City squad were still finding their feet in the Premier League, Silva proved to be their most important player, chipping in with the necessary goals and assists to keep City’s title challenge afloat up until when they took the top spot on the table.
He has also been very important for the Premier League title holders in the UEFA Champions League this season. On his return to his hometown in Portugal with City in the Champions League round of 16 fixture against Sporting Lisbon, Silva shone the brightest.
Although he was denied a hat-trick his two goals and assist health city to a 5-0 rout of the Portuguese giants in Europe’s premier club competition.
Being a former Benfica man himself, he will be very pleased to have scored two goals against Sporting as the Benfica-Porto-Sporting rivalry is the biggest rivalry in Portuguese football.
His two goals in that round of 16 fixture takes his total for the season to 10 goals in all competitions for City. He is currently on a 10-game goal drought in the Premier League but City would be thankful for his contributions in the first part of the season which greatly helped advance their course to defend their title.
Barcelona, meanwhile, are struggling to get back on their feet and will realise that missing out on a player like Bernardo Silva could be one of the reasons why they are where they are today.
