2023-07-12 19:54:13
Vitor Roque is now officially a Barça player. The young Brazilian promise, just 18 years old, will land at the culé club in the 2024-25 campaign after the Barça entity has reached an agreement with Athletico Paranaense for 30 million fixed euros and 31 more as variables. Tigrinho, as he is known in Brazil, has committed to Barça until June 2031 and will have a termination clause of 500 kilos.
In this way, the Catalans close one of the great objectives that had been marked for this summer. Vitor Roque is the third addition that Barça has made after the signings of Ilkay Gündogan and Iñigo Martínez, but unlike the previous two, his arrival is a bet more for the future than for the present. In the culé club they did not want to stop his projection with the competition of Robert Lewandowski and that has led the entity of Joan Laporta to make the decision that his landing in the team occurs in the 2024-25 season, when he is already 19 years old and The Polish forward adds 36 and is going to face his last year of contract.
To reach this agreement, Barcelona has carried out titanic negotiations. The culés reached an agreement in principle with Athletico Paranaense on June 18 for 35 million fixed euros plus 10 in variables, but everything fell apart as teams appeared in the bid. Manchester United, Tottenham or Paris Saint-Germain were also interested in the Brazilian and that endangered an operation for which Barça finally had to become a financial engineer with a number of variables even higher than the fixed part, a ‘rare avis’ in the transfer markets. The total amount could finally rise to 61 million euros if all the conditions agreed by both clubs are met and Athletico Paranaense reserves 20% of a hypothetical transfer made by Barça in the future.
Barça thus becomes one of the great promises of the world scene. Vitor Roque has exploded in this 2023 both at the club and national team level. With the ‘Canarinha’ he won the South American sub-20 tournament played at the beginning of the year, being the top scorer with six goals, and with Athletico Paranaense he has managed to be the attack reference when he was just 18 years old last February. With ‘Furaçao’ he comes from scoring 15 goals in 30 games, including three in a Copa Libertadores that will face its final stretch starting in August and in which the Brazilian club has high hopes. Not in vain, the option that he could play that competition was one of the conditions that had been put since the beginning of the negotiations.
The arrival of Vitor Roque, however, could even be brought forward to the month of January if Barcelona’s accounts allow it. At this moment the culés cannot register the player due to the financial ‘fair play’, but that could change if the sale of players like Raphinha, Ferran Torres or Ansu Fati, footballers with a high salary and who can see their minutes reduced this course after the arrival of Gundogan.
Vitor Roque is called to be one of Barcelona’s great stars of the future and, as such, will have a termination clause according to that ranking. 500 million euros must be disbursed by the club that intends to take over his services, an armor similar to the one that future players already have in the entity such as Ronald Araujo, Pedri, Gavi or Ansu Fati.
The big ones look at Brazil
Tigrinho responds to the classic profile of a Brazilian striker. He has a great appetite for goal, but he is also a player capable of falling on both sides, having speed of movement and partnering both from behind and in space when the team requires it.
The signing of Vitor Roque results in an increasingly upward trend at Real Madrid and Barcelona, that of importing talent directly from Brazil. The whites triumphed with the signings of Vinicius and Rodrygo, not so much with that of Reinier, and that has given way to a technical secretariat focused on the Rio de Janeiro country. This summer the two clubs have once again extended their networks there, shutting down two of the most important promises such as Endrick and Vitor Roque. Two players designated to be the future of the ‘Canarinha’ attack and who will face each other in Spanish football.
#Vitor #Roque #Barça