If the long and protracted Frenkie de Jong transfer saga has not already been messy enough, there is one way of making it a whole lot messier. “De Jong should consider legal action v Barcelona and all players should be behind him,” Gary Neville tweeted last week. “A club spending fortunes on new players whilst not paying the ones they have under contract their full money is immoral and a breach. @FIFPRO should be all over bullying like this and stop it.”
Predictably, Neville’s tweet did not go down well among Barcelona’s support – with some even going as far as to pretend his infamous spell in charge of Valencia went even worse than it actually did – but you do not have to be a former Manchester United right-back to sympathise with the sentiment behind it. For a financially-challenged club like Barça to push a player out so that they can fund a summer of extravagant spending is one thing. To do so while refusing to pay him wages that he is owed is another entirely.
