Barca threatened to de jong
The source from The Athletic said Barca wrote to De Jong on July 15 on this issue. They think that the contract to extend De Jong signed with Barca on October 20, 2020 showed signs of illegal. President Joan Laporta and colleagues are thought to have sufficient evidence to prove that the parties involved in that contract violate.
Under Josep Bartomeu, Barca announced the recruitment of De Jong from Ajax in January 2019, but the contract took effect in July 2019. At that time, he signed a five -year contract, the term until the end of June 2024.
On October 20, 2020, when Bartomeu was still in Vi, Barca extended with De Jong until the end of June 2026. The two sides reached an agreement for De Jong to reduce their salary to US $ 18 million per year, for the 2020-2021 and 2021-2022 season.
Barca announced the extension to De Jong at the same time they signed a new contract for goalkeeper Marc-Andre Ter Stegen and midfielder Gerard Pique, Clement Lenglet. This was the last important decision of Bartomeu, before he resigned exactly a week later.
The Barca letter sent to De Jong on July 15 said the team is ready to participate in criminal proceedings and investigate the wrongdoing of the parties in the contract.
The Bartomeu side confirmed that De Jong's contract was completely legal, and was approved by the legal and La Liga agencies. In an interview with Mundo Deportivo in 2021, Bartomeu said that his group had worked "seriously and responsibly".
Barca and De Jong representatives discussed more since that letter. Laporta believes that De Jong may be interrupted if Barca sued Bartomeu's sue. Bartomeu and former Oscar Grau CEO, and Legal Manager Roman Gomez Ponti was captured by Catalonia police in March 2021 because of the Barcagate dirty media case.
Barca is still owed to De Jong about 20 million USD. Many sources said Laporta wanted him to remove this debt and accept to switch to Man Utd. Barca and Man Utd have reached De Jong transfer agreement, but the Dutch midfielder did not want to go to Manchester.
What Barca is doing can strengthen the views of the President of the Dutch Association Evgeniy Levchenko. Mr. Levchenko once thought that De Jong was a victim of blackmailing from Barca. But Laporta denied.
The FIFPro World Player Association is also monitoring the problem between Barca and De Jong.
Barca is doing the same thing with Gerard Pique and Ter Stegen, while Lenglet is being lent in Tottenham. But there is no basis that Laporta also threatens criminal proceedings with the above players.
De Jong did not want to stay in Barca, but he did not say he wanted to go to any stop. Chelsea is said to be interested in this deal, but has not yet sent an official proposal. Barca is persuading Chelsea to pay the transfer fee, and their salary owes De Jong. Chelsea has the advantage of playing in the Champions League, if compared to Man Utd, it only plays in the Europa League, but this is not the key point in De Jong's decision.
Despite financial difficulties, Barca has recruited many prominent players such as Franck Kessie, Andreas Christensen, Raphinha, Robert Lewandowski and Jules Kounte.
When the A's contacted, barca refused to comment on De Jong.
