Barca´s Eto´o gets extra week of holidays

Barcelona have given their Cameroon striker Samuel Eto’o, whose future at the club is uncertain, an extra week of holidays to buy time to negotiate his departure, Spanish media reported Thursday.

The club resume training on Monday but the player will only join up with the team on July 27 along with the six Spanish internationals who took part in the Confederations Cup — Xavi, Gerard Pique, Sergi Busquets, Carles Puyol and Dani Alves — as well as Andres Iniesta and Lionel Messi.

Coach Josep Guardiola no longer wants Eto’o in his team and the move is an attempt by the European and Spanish champions to “buy time” to offload the striker who has one year left on his contract, daily La Vanguardia reported.

Guardiola wants to replace the 28-year-old with another striker such as Valencia’s David Villa or Atletico Madrid’s Diego Forlan, it added.

When he took over as Barcelona coach from Frank Rijkaard last year, he made it clear that he wanted Eto’o, Ronaldinho and Deco to leave, reportedly because of problems that the striker had caused in the dressing room.

Ronaldinho was sold to AC Milan, Deco went to Chelsea but Eto’o stayed at the club because Barcelona did not receive any convincing offers for him — and history risks repeating itself.

Barcelona reportedly wanted Eto’o, who scored in the Champions League final win over Manchester United, to accept an offer from Manchester City but the player refused and the English club eventually gave up on recruiting him.

Spanish media have indicated wage demands of some ten million euros (14 million dollars) a year were frightening off top clubs.

Barcelona’s efforts to recruit Villa have hit a roadblock over money with financially-troubled Valencia refusing to sell the player for less than 50 million euros while the Spanish champions are offering 42 million euros.

The 27-year-old, who has made it clear that he wants to leave Valencia, has offered to pay the difference out of his own pocket, several Spanish newspapers reported Thursday.

Meanwhile, Pablo Forlan, the father of Uruguayan international Diego Forlan has said that his son would like the chance to play at Barcelona.

“Diego is at Atletico, very happy there because he has been treated wonderfully, but without a doubt playing in a team like Barca would interest any player,” he told COM radio.

But Atletico president Enrique Cerezo has refused to let the top scorer in the Spanish league last season go.

Barcelona announced Wednesday that it had singed Brazilian left-back Maxwell from Italian side Inter Milan for 4.5 million euros, its first recruitment of this current period.