Barca to start pre-season with few changes

Barcelo, July 11: Spanish football giants Barcelo will start the pre-season on Wednesday under the new technical direction of Ernesto Valverde, who replaces Luis Enrique after three seasons, but with few changes in the squad, about 50 days before the summer market closes. The club announced on July 5 the renewal of the contract of Messi until 2021, but apart from that, this early summer has seen more news of possible signings or young talents leaving the La Masia youth academy than any actual movement of players.

The expected return of Gerard Deulofeu, for whom Barcelo paid 12 million euros to recover from English side Everton, and the farewell to Jeremy Mathieu, who went free to Sporting de Portugal, and the same with Cristian Tello and Real Betis, have been the only operations of Barça so far this summer. The most significant changes have taken place in the technical side, with the losses of Luis Enrique, who is taking a gap of a year from coaching, and his assistant Juan Carlos Unzue, now the new coach of Celta, and the arrival of Ernesto Valverde and his assistant, Jon Aspiazu, from Athletic Bilbao. The new coaching staff started their journey on Tuesday by getting used to the sports city before the first pre-season training on Wednesday, which will see some absences including all the players who have participated in the Confederations Cup, German Marc ter Stegen and Portuguese Andre Gomes, as well as the Spaniards who reached the fil of European U-21 Championship, Gerard Deulofeu and Denis Suarez. IANS