Bartomeu's priorities: first Xavi and then Koeman

Ronald Koeman will almost certainly be the new coach of FC Barcelona for the 2020-21 season, replacing Quique Setién. But the dutch coach was not the first choice. As happened this January, when the club's sports management decided to dismiss Ernesto Valverde, The first one that Bartomeu sounded out was Xavi Hernández.

The Blaugrana leader, aware that Setién's stage had ended, contacted Xavi before the quarterfinal match against Bayern in the Champions League, making it clear that no one at the club gave a penny for the Cantabrian coach or for the team.

It was Bartomeu himself who called Xavi, since relations with the technical secretary, Eric Abidal, were a bit decimated after his visit to Doha in January and his subsequent statements, in which he assured that there had never been an offer for the coach from Al Sadd.

This time, the telephone conversation did not last long: Bartomeu already knew Xavi's conditions to come to Barcelona. However, the situation had taken a radical change compared to January. to get started, the coach had renewed one more year for Al Sadd and had also made a very strong bet, convincing Santi Cazorla to come to the Qatari club.

In addition, he still had a lot of reluctance as to whether with this directive he would be able to deploy his project in its entirety or end up having to endure fringes and exceptions. Faced with so many doubts, Xavi once again rejected Bartomeu's offer, who this time was willing to accept most of his conditions.

In January, he hesitated for almost three days, after the insistence of Abidal and the CEO, Oscar Grau, and with a personal call from Bartomeu, as a last-minute resource to try to convince him. In this August, the negotiations barely lasted half an hour.

Faced with Xavi's new refusal, Bartomeu waited for the Bayern match.After the historical humiliation on Friday in Lisbon, on Saturday afternoon, as explained by the journalist Lluis Canut, the manager contacted Ronald Koeman by telephone to offer him the position of coach. For the second time, the Dutchman was the second course at Bartomeu's table, but this time everything indicates that he will accept.