Official: Marlon Santos leaves Barcelona for Sassuolo
Marlon Santos has joined Serie A side Sassuolo due to Barcelona being unable to fit him in the team because they had filled their non-EU players quota.
Barcelona have had an excellent transfer window so far with four new signings and seven players departing permanently including Paulinho even though Guangzhou Evergrande have the option not to sign him permanently at the end of his loan.
Marlon is the latest player to leave with Sassuolo signing him for €6 million. However, this transfer is slightly more complicated than that because there is multiple clauses. The Italian side only own 50% of his economic rights with the other half being a €6 million clause which is activated when he plays 50 game for them. Barcelona also have a buyback clause in his contract, but the amount hasn’t been revealed. It will be higher than the total fee of the two clauses, so somewhere between €15-20 million is likely.
Sassuolo are an interesting team for him to join due to how they have committed to developing talent while maintaining their Serie A status over the past few seasons. Current Roma manager Eusebio Di Francesco brought them up to the top division in 2013 and took them to their best ever finish of sixth in 2016 before joining I Giallorossi. However, they haven’t had as much success in recent seasons with new manager Roberto De Zerbi hoping to end that.
Lorenzo Pellegrini, Domenico Berardi, Sime Vrsaljko, Matteo Politano and Nicola Sansone are just some of the players to have used the club as a pathway for their careers in recent seasons; although Berardi hasn’t left yet like the others.
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Santos is among a wave of young talent that has joined the club such as Jens Odgaard, Jeremie Boga, Enrico Brignola and Manuel Locatelli as well as a few experienced players to bolster them such as Kevin-Prince Boateng and Khouma Babacar. De Zerbi will be hoping that they can gel together and provide the right balance of youthful vigor and know-how.
This transfer leaves Barcelona with four senior centre-backs, although Sergio Busquets could be played there if they are desperate. However, that wouldn’t be advised due to his lack of pace which would make a high defensive line extremely dangerous. Gerard Pique is the only right-footed centre-back in the squad, but Samuel Umtiti and Clement Lenglet could cover that if needed, although, once again, it wouldn’t be an ideal scenario.
Next. Sergi Palencia joins Bordeaux on one-year loan. dark
The 22-year-old is the victim of unfortunate circumstances because he could have played a role for the team if the club hadn’t filled the non-EU places. However, this is a good piece of business because he can develop in another top league, with Barcelona having the option to re-sign him if he keeps improving. Thomas Vermaelen’s contract runs out next summer, so he could be the Belgian’s replacement if they don’t find anyone suitable in the transfer market.