Since Thomas Vermaelen opened the subject of his Barcelona future, the Spanish press haven’t been able to stop talking about it.
Apart from dismissing the Belgian’s claims of Barcelona blocking a transfer, with Vermaelen saying Everton wanted him, it’s all opened up the idea of a January switch.
Despite Vermaelen saying Barcelona value him and turned Everton and others away, that’s been disputed, and as Sport say ‘these words don’t agree with facts’.
The facts would be that Vermaelen, having appeared for Belgium in September and October, hasn’t played a single minute for Barcelona so far this season.
Roberto Martinez clearly still has confidence in the player, but Sport explain that if the situation doesn’t get much better, Vermaelen could look for a January exit to help his World Cup aims.
The central defender is said to still be confident he’s going to figure a lot more for Barcelona, especially after the current international break, but if he doesn’t then the Everton links will again have more basis to them.
This is going to be one for Ronald Koeman to ponder. Vermaelen is clearly a talented defender but the doubts over his ability to play a good number of matches remain, and without Barcelona testing that theory, it’d be a blind gamble.
