Few cases will be found in football history books in which a player is sold twice in the same week. That is the case of Jules Koundé (23 years old), who when he had everything agreed to sign with Chelsea, when he began to pack his bags, to think about improving his English and adapting to the less and less severe British temperatures, he saw how His future took a 180 degree turn.
The London team disappeared from the map and Barça came into action, which had always been their first option, but needed to activate their famous levers. From Thursday to Monday. Four days in which his future changed forever. 50 million plus some variables that could reach up to 12.5, as revealed by Cadena SER, made him travel a much shorter path from Seville to Barcelona, where yesterday he was presented in society at the Joan Gamper sports city.
On his first day, the French player expressed himself in correct Castilian Spanish and did not rule out launching into Catalan in the coming months. Accompanied by his close relatives and several of his friends, he wore a black suit and maroon tie, and a hairstyle for the occasion: African braids. "I'm proud. I arrive at a very big and ambitious club, and I am too. I want to prepare myself to reach the top”, he said after signing his contract, for which he will earn 9.5 million gross the first year and 12 the next four, with a clause of 1,000 million.
Koundé's arrival was possible thanks to the player's insistence on waiting for Barça to enter the scene. Although for him it did not suppose any effort, because it was always clear that he wanted to wear the Barça shirt. “I had another opportunity, but I wanted to wait until Barça could reach an agreement with Sevilla. And when it was possible I chose Barça, it was clear to me. But it was not an effort ”he explained.
Raised at the Girondins de Bordeaux school, where he was recruited for the first team by Uruguayan Gustavo Poyet, Koundé made the jump to Sevilla three seasons ago. “I have always felt Xavi's affection, that he really wanted me to come here. I have come to adapt to the style, but he has asked me to continue doing what he was already doing in Seville: be aggressive, play from behind and be committed. I want to grow because I'm still young and I know where I'm going, Barça is very demanding”, he said.
Koundé is the penultimate piece of the pharaonic Barça that Joan Laporta is building in an unimaginable market. Chimera after chimera and lever after lever, he has been adding pieces to design the team that Xavi Hernández claimed. “He is a highly desired signing by our coach, very insistent to incorporate Jules. We want players like that, who want to come to our club, that's why I'm very satisfied”, conceded the culé president.
