Earlier on Wednesday we covered a story from Barcelona based newspaper Sport about Gerard Deulofeu and the Catalonia national team.
It was reported the footballer had asked Watford to release him to play for the national team next week, in a match against Venezuela on March 25th. It’s an unofficial match, with Catalonia not being an official FIFA team.
Therefore, clubs can choose whether they release players for the fixture or not, and a few have knocked the request back. Sport said that Watford were being sympathetic to Deulofeu’s desire to go and play, and it sounded positive.
That optimism was misplaced, as Marca now report that Deulofeu is one of the players who were named in the initial squad, but then refused permission to travel.
The biggest names left in the squad are Xavi, Gerard Pique, Marc Bartra, Aleix Vidal, Oriol Romeu and Bojan.
There’s no further detail on Watford’s reasoning but had Deulofeu travelled and picked up an injury, it wouldn’t have seemed the wisest decision.
