(Football news) Mateu Alemany has made an incredible u-turn on his decision as he was set to join Aston Villa but now subsequently he will stay at the club. Alemany announced his departure from the Camp Nou two weeks ago and he was in advanced talks to join Unai Emery at Aston Villa after receiving an offer that was touted as “too good to turn down.” However, talks with the Barca hierarchy helped convince him to remain at Spotify Camp Nou and continue re-building the club
ASporting Director Jordi Cruyff will leave at the end of the season when his contract expires after he officially announced his desire to “embark on new professional endeavours” when Barca won the league title. Former Barca and Portugal midfielder Deco is going to join the Catalan club and work alongside Alemany, who has a contract which runs until 2024. Alemany joined Barca in 2021 when Joan Laporta was elected president he oversaw a very frantic transfer window as they sold a lot of players to fund the signings of Robert Lewandowski, Raphinha and Jules Kounde.
The transfer guru has received a lot of praise for putting together a squad that has saw Barca win their first LaLiga title since 2019. Alemany’s biggest strength was his knowledge of LaLiga’s financial fair play rules and spending the money properly. Barca are set to spend another transfer window where they will have limited funds and have to navigate through LaLiga regulations again if they want to strengthen their squad. Barca need to raise more than €150 million to be able to register new contracts and make new signings.
Alemany and Deco are the men assigned with the challenge of rebuilding Barca by taking strides forward in the Champions League. After studying law, Alemany in the 1990s worked for his local LaLiga side Mallorca as a chief executive and later on became the club’s president. After that he joined Valencia, where he was the director of football for two years helping Valencia win the Copa del Rey in 2019.
He joined Barca as part of Laporta’s backroom team after he was elected as the president for a second time, having previously held the role from 2003 and 2010. Barca faced various financial hurdles last summer at the Camp Nou, while Almeny also had to deal with the departure of Lionel Messi, but he still found ways to strengthen their squad while working within LaLiga’s strict financial fair play policies.
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