Joao Cancelo moved to Barcelona on loan during the summer window, in a move the player very much wanted.
The Catalan media have repeatedly stated that Cancelo made a financial effort to secure the loan away from Manchester City, which almost certainly means he took a significant pay cut to help out Barcelona’s finances.
Things have been going well for him since the move, and he’s being repeatedly heralded along with his compatriot Joao Felix, who arrived on loan from Atletico Madrid.
There’s little doubt Cancelo is trying to prove himself to earn a permanent move from Manchester City, and that will take some doing given the financial restrictions Barcelona continue to be under.
Mundo Deportivo are thrilled to have managed to get an interview with both Joaos, and they present the chats in their Thursday edition.
The Catalan newspaper put it to Cancelo that he’s only been at Barca for a few weeks but he’s settled in so quickly it seems like he’s been there forever, to which he replied: “My family, all my friends know that I wanted to play here for a long time, it is a club that always excited me because my idols played here. Now I want to show people the player I am, lately I haven’t had the performance I wanted and I want to give my best version to help this club get back to where it deserves.”
“And that is thanks to my City teammates, the coach, Pep, his staff, who are a very good group, very united and you can see that, because for me now they are the best team in the world and coming here was a risk, Yes, but it is Barcelona and when the opportunity comes to you from Barça you have to come.”
Mundo Deportivo then pressed on the player’s future and what he’s prepared to do to get another transfer to Barcelona next summer: “First I want to perform here. It is not because of these two games that the entire team did well, with two victories that we convinced. What I want is to perform, and at the end to speak.
“First, perform, win titles with this club, be an important player on the team, and at the end talk about staying or not. It will depend on the club, on how I performed. In the end they measure you by performance, if you don’t perform, you don’t stay. If you perform, they will love you. So I want to perform, work and enjoy this club.”
Manchester City will be looking to get a good transfer fee for Cancelo next summer, whether that will be from Barcelona remains to be seen.
Either way, it can only be good news for them that he’s performing well.
