Barcelona trying desperately to offload midfield flop Miralem Pjanić — reports

Once upon a time, Miralem Pjanić was linked fairly heavily to Chelsea, but those times have long gone. In the five years hence, Pjanić had himself four good seasons at Juventus and one terrible season at Barcelona. Unfortunately for him, and Barca, that season was the most recent season, having arrived on what was essentially a high-priced swap deal with Juve for fellow midfielder Arthur last summer.

Neither side have been too pleased with the outcome of this exchange, with neither player impressing at all. But the situation is much more dire for Barcelona, who are desperately trying to cut their wage bill to afford Lionel Messi’s new contract in a post-pandemic economy. Pjanić’s €8m per year weighs so heavily in fact that they tried to convince him to leave for free, which of course he didn’t accept because why would he forgo three (3!) more years of a guaranteed contract at age 31 (31!).

So Barca are now desperately trying to offload the 31-year-old, saturating their corner of the rumor mill with stories of supposed interest from the likes of Manchester United, Juventus, Tottenham Hotspur, and of course Chelsea, which is why we have to mention this nonsense.

So yeah, good luck with that, Barcelona. You ain’t getting anything out of us other than a sympathetic ear regarding bad contracts for average players.