Barcelona meet Athletic Bilbao in the Copa del Rey Round of 16 clash but Xavi has dropped Ousmane Dembele from the squad.
Ousmane Dembele has been told to pack his bags immediately after he was dropped from Barcelona’s roster for their Copa del Rey meeting with Athletic Club on Thursday.
On Wednesday, Xavi warned the youngster to take an instant decision regarding his agreement with the club.
Since Dembele has not arrived at a conclusion yet, the director of football Mateu Alemany issued a pathway for the winger.
Ahead of Barca’s clash with Bilbao, Alemany talked about Dembele at a press conference. He said: “With Ousmane and his agents we started conversations around the month of July.”
“In all this time, almost seven months, we have talked. Barca has made different offers, we have tried to find a way for the player to continue with us. And those offers have been continuously rejected by his agents.”
“It seems obvious to us that the player does not want to continue at Barcelona. And is not committed to Barca’s future project.”
“We told him and his agents that he must leave the club immediately. Because we want to have players committed to the project.”
“We expect a transfer to take place before January 31. The sporting consequence is that we don’t want to have players who don’t want to be at Barca.”
“The fact that he was not in the [squad] list for today is the consequence of this whole process. The coach has our full support, it’s a consistent attitude.”
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