Barcelona Vice President Outlines Club's Spending Plans Amid Fresh Antoine Griezmann Rumours

Barcelona vice president Jordi Mestre has said the club are not prepared to spend 'crazy money' this summer, when asked about potentially reviving a move for

Barcelona vice president Jordi Mestre has said the club are not prepared to spend 'crazy money' this summer, when asked about potentially reviving a move for Antoine Griezmann. 

It was widely thought that Barca had all but signed the forward from Atletico Madrid prior to the World Cup back in June, but the 28-year-old made a spectacle of rejecting their advances, releasing his own one-off TV special entitled 'La Decision' where he announced he would stay in Madrid. 

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That seemed to be the end of the longstanding speculation, but 10 months is a long time in football, and rumours about Barca bringing the move back to life have already surfaced ahead of the summer transfer window.

Most recently it has been reported that the player is prepared to take a drastic pay cut to secure a move to Camp Nou, and when asked about the rumours on Catalunya Radio (as per SPORT) Mestre didn't outright deny it - but said it would have to be for a reasonable fee.

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"First, we'll listen to what the coaches want," he said. "However we won't throw around crazy money to sign any footballer if we can't afford to."

Given that a £100m fee has been touted for the World Cup winner, it begins to seem as if Mestre's definition of 'crazy money' would have to be fairly loose if they were to justify a summer move for Griezmann.

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Atletico, meanwhile, have already lost Lucas Hernandez to Bayern Munich, and are reported to be facing an uphill battle to hold on to a number of other key stars, so it doesn't seem likely they will be particularly keen to sanction the sale of their star attraction.