Why Barcelona didn’t sign Marcus Rashford for free

Robin Bairner

• 15 Feb 2023 12:25 GMT
• 3 min read

Barcelona will face Manchester United in the Europa League on Thursday, with the Catalan side seeing victory in the tie imperative as they seek to temper their financial losses for the year after an early Champions League exit.

Undoubtedly the biggest threat to their future in the competition is in-form England striker Marcus Rashford, who has scored 21 goals in 34 matches this season.

Rashford may not start for United given their priority is now the Premier League title race but had things been different, he might have lined up for Barcelona instead.

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According to a report from Mundo Deportivo, Barca were on the brink of signing Rashford in 2019, when he was out of contract in June 2020.

Rashford would have arrived at Camp Nou as a replacement for Luis Suarez, who would leave for Atletico Madrid in the summer, but the deal broke down.

According to the Catalan source, there was a last-minute change of heart from Rashford, who felt that the move would be “too much” for him.

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Instead of capturing Rashford, the only forward that Barcelona signed that summer was Francisco Trincao from Braga, with the Catalans paying €31 million for a player who was considered to be an up-and-coming star at that time.

Trincao remains on Barcelona’s books, yet he spent last season on loan at Wolves and is presently at Sporting CP on a temporary basis. The 23-year-old has fallen woefully short of the expectation Barca had for him and now has an Estimated Transfer Value of just €16m – around half of what the Catalans paid for him.

Rashford, meanwhile, has come back into form after a difficult couple of seasons. Indeed, the 25-year-old is now considered to be one of Europe’s most in-form players and indispensable to Man Utd, with eight goals in his last nine Premier League matches.

His contract expires in 2024, and though the likes of Bayern Munich and PSG are monitoring the situation, Man Utd are unlikely to allow it to get to the point it did in 2019, when he nearly escaped them to join Barcelona.