Italian sides enter race for Barcelona defender

The end of the transfer window is going to be a busy one for Barcelona. Ansu Fati is reportedly close to joining Premier League side Brighton on loan, Clement Lenglet will follow him to England with a deal now agreed upon for the French defender to spend the year on loan at Aston Villa and now two Italian sides have entered the race to sign Eric Garcia.

Girona have been leading the charge for the signature of Garcia, with the 22-year-old open to leaving Barcelona in search of first-team football.

Xavi is reluctant to let him leave considering his ability to play as both a central defender and holding midfielder, but if the right deal arrives it’s expected that Garcia will be allowed to move on loan.

Now, according to a report by Alfredo Martínez, both AS Roma and Fiorentina have entered the race for the talented if inconsistent Spanish defender.

It’s unclear how serious their interest is, but Garcia playing in a league that perfected the art of defending could be very beneficial to the player and his parent club.

Eric Garcia is not the only player looking to leave for first-team football

The issue with having a large squad of talented players is that there simply aren’t enough minutes to go around.

When everyone is healthy, a combination of Ronald Araujo, Jules Kounde and Andreas Christensen will make up the preferred pairing,

In certain games where Barca is not expecting to do a lot of defending, Xavi prefers to play Frenkie de Jong as a central defender, and with Inigo Martinez finally healthy that means that Garcia is well down the pecking order.

Abde Ezzazouli is currently having the same conversation with Barcelona management, with the young Moroccan worried about his playing time, and there is talk that any move for Abde could be a permanent transfer.