Where are they now? The 4 players Lionel Messi told Barcelona to sign in 2017
The summer of 2017 was a big one for Barcelona – and Lionel Messi reportedly intervened in the club’s transfer strategy in response.
The Catalan club went into that transfer window off the back of a disappointing 2016-17 campaign, in which they won the Copa del Rey but watched on as Real Madrid claimed both La Liga and the Champions League.
Early in that summer, Spanish outlet Diario Gol reported that star man Lionel Messi had told the club’s hierarchy to go out and sign four players to get them back in contention to compete with Los Blancos. We’ve revisited those four names while taking that tabloid report with a pinch of salt.
Hector Bellerin
The right-back hasn’t quite hit the heights that many predicted when Bellerin first broke onto the scene with electric pace at Arsenal a decade ago.
Like Cesc Fabregas before him, Bellerin had honed his skills at La Masia before continuing his development at Hale End, eventually breaking through to play over 200 times for the Gunners.
Bellerin’s stock has fallen considerably since 2017, when it was arguably at its highest. He gradually fell out of favour at the Emirates, eventually terminated his contract and spent short stints at Sporting Lisbon, Real Betis and Barcelona before settling back at Betis last year.
A decent midtable full-back and an all-round good egg, but not quite the world-beater regular Spain international he once looked like becoming. The one player on this list that hasn’t ended up lining up alongside Messi, having arrived back at Barcelona after the icon left.
Marco Verratti
“We forget at times that Messi is a perfectly normal person like everyone else,” Verratti told Sky Sport Italia after the eight-time Ballon d’Or winner’s arrival at PSG in 2021.
“It was a difficult start for him, he is settling in more and more, we welcomed him like a king to the locker room and it’s a privilege to play alongside him.
“He’s spectacular and enjoys himself in training too. He’s a really simple guy without airs and I like people like him, because I am the same. We get along both on and off the field.”
Verratti and Messi won back-to-back Ligue 1 titles in their two seasons playing alongside one another in Paris. With such boundless energy and selflessness, it’s easy to see why Messi would’ve wanted him at Barcelona.
The Italian has spent the last season turning out for Qatari outfit Al-Arabi. Which seems like a real waste for a man of his talents, still only 31 years of age.
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Gerard Deulofeu
You might be thinking “wasn’t Deulofeu already at Barca?” and you’d be half-right. This was slap bang in the middle of that period in the winger’s career in which he kept moving back and forth between various loans and buy-back clauses.
After two decent-ish years at Everton and a loan away to AC Milan, Deulofeu rejoined his boyhood Blaugrana in the summer of 2017.
It made sense to activate the clause to help bolster their options, but he inevitably found regular starts limited and returned to the Premier League six months later, joining Watford on a loan deal that was later made permanent.
Deulofeu left Vicarage Road following the Hornets’ relegation in 2020 and has since spent four relatively settled years at fellow Pozzo club Udinese.
Unfortunately, he’s struggled with a serious knee injury over the past 18 months and he didn’t play a minute of football last season.
The 30-year-old’s current deal at Udinese expires next summer and recent reports from Italy suggest his future as a professional footballer is in doubt.
Ousmane Dembele
Barcelona did sign Dembele towards the end of the 2017 summer window, but it was very much a panic buy following Neymar’s world-record €222million move to PSG.
You don’t imagine that they would’ve splurged €105million had they not been desperate. Borussia Dortmund had Barcelona over a barrel when it came to negotiations for Dembele, who had caught the eye after an exciting debut season in the Bundesliga.
The French forward had his moments at Camp Nou, but in hindsight, Barcelona would’ve fared better by keeping their powder dry and not rushing to reinvest the Neymar war chest funds on a lesser replacement.
Dembele notched 40 goals and 43 assists in 185 appearances for Barcelona across six seasons and was eventually sold at a considerable loss to PSG last summer.
He didn’t hesitate to celebrate after scoring a goal that helped dump his former club out of the Champions League last season. Ouch.