There was a time when Marco Verratti was a much more wanted man than he is now, when he was less settled in Paris, where he now gets to play with Lionel Messi.
Barcelona were interested, since they like a miniature midfielder with excellent technique, and the player’s agent at the time, Donati di Campli, tried to get his client the move.
It never happened, with the Italy international staying in Paris and securing some titles along the way, but the representative has never forgotten the failed move, and took aim at the Ligue 1 side on Friday in an interview with AS, where he also gave Kylian Mbappé some advice.
Describing how the move to Barcelona failed, once again accusing the French club of forcing him out of the picture and replacing him with Mino Raiola, the agent went as far as saying Verratti was ‘afraid due to the reaction of PSG, who threatened him with the possibility of ending up in the stands if he didn’t renew his contract’.
Di Campli ‘denounced’ Paris Saint-Germain to FIFA, UEFA and the Italian Federation for their behaviour, but no action was taken, and, as he puts it, ‘Marco changed agents but didn’t change teams’ while the whole matter ended up causing him ‘very important damage, personally and also financially’.
Then came the matter of Mbappé, who allegedly would like to leave this summer for Real Madrid, and not Barcelona, and the agent had important advice for the Frenchman.
He said: “What happened with Rabiot will happen to him, because all of this is a personal matter for PSG, not about money. They think they can buy everything. If Mbappé doesn’t renew, he will go to the stands. They don’t care at all about not having the money now. If I have to bet, I would say he doesn’t leave, from personal experience”.
He continued: “The only hope is Leonardo, who is a football man. And that is important, but even so I see it as very difficult, almost impossible. With Al-Khelaifi and PSG, you have a problem and it’s as if they are lazy with money.
“Mbappé must not offend the emir and tell him that he is leaving, because it’s in his hands. Hopefully, he’s lucky, because PSG, in the end, aren’t tricking anyone. They want to buy history, but history isn’t bought. History is written. And they can’t. They can’t”.
