The Daily Mail reports that Miralem Pjanic has no desire to leave Barcelona this summer and emphatically stated his desire to stick with the Blaugrana, which could possibly scuttle Ronald Koeman’s move for Gini Wijnaldum or at least make it a bit more challenging.
Continued speculation over the Dutch player’s Liverpool future had pointed to the likelihood of the Barca coach being able to offload former Juventus star Pjanic to accommodate bringing in the Reds’ No.5, whom Koeman has worked well with before and thinks highly of.
“Yes, of course, I did not sign for Barca to leave the following year, I signed to make history at a club that had been on my path for many years,” the Bosnia and Herzegovina international told Mundo Deportivo (via the Daily Mail).
“They told me that my character and my experience would be vital to grow a generation of young people from La Masia who were climbing very strongly. Balance is essential and I came to provide that balance.”
Recent reports have indicated that Wijnaldum’s potential departure from Anfield this summer as being imminent, but it would now appear that Pjanic has thrown a curved ball that could still prevent a switch to Catalonia from occurring.
Should Koeman encounter serious snags in offloading Pjanic from the Camp Nou side, there is a possibility that a move to La Liga could be off the cards for the Dutch international – a slim possibility, but still one, nonetheless.