Barcelona president Joan Laporta has confirmed that the club’s intention is to sign both Joao Cancelo and Joao Felix on permanents transfers when their respective loan deals end.
Neither loan included an option to make it permanent in the original agreements, which means talks with Manchester City and Atletico Madrid will have to take place.
“Cancelo and Felix have been playing on a high level since they joined. The club will be able to keep them for the coming seasons,” Laporta insisted. “We plan to start negotiations for them shortly, and we have good relations with both Man City and Atleti.”
Barca had been trying to get a deal over the line for Cancelo, who fell out of favour in Manchester very suddenly last season, for much of the summer and eventually secured it on deadline day.
Cancelo spent the latter half of last season on loan at Bayern but the German champions declined to trigger an option to buy for €70m (£61.6m). Bayern official Hasan Salihamidzic hinted very early into the loan that the fixed fee clause wouldn’t be used, although there was some hope of negotiating a slightly smaller figure that ultimately didn’t materialise.
Like Cancelo, Felix spent the second half of last season at another club, having joined Chelsea in January. 90min reported at the time that the Portuguese would have been prepared to remain at the club longer even without Champions League football this season. PSG also showed interest.
Barcelona’s interest emerged later after giving up on trying to sign Bernardo Silva from Manchester City and Felix was understandably keen to join the club.
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