Verratti reveals why he didn’t join Barcelona this year

Bengaluru, October 22: Paris Saint-German star Marco Verratti has revealed that he could have moved to Barcelona or any other club in the summer but the club's activity in transfer market convinced him to stay.

Spanish giants, Barcelona were mainly believed to be targeting Verratti this summer as a next suitable replacement for their ageing star Andreas Iniesta and several bids were also made to lure away the player. Although later the transfer eventually didn't go through.

But now while talking about his transfer linkup of Barcelona, the French midfielder provided an honest opinion and claimed that although he thought about moving from Paris, however, later a talk with new sporting director Antero Henrique convinced him to stay with the club's future plans and he chose to stay put for the time being.

“I’m honest, for the first time in five years I wondered if I should stay here,” he told L’Equipe.

“People think that I play for PSG for the money, but I could get that elsewhere, too. If I had moved in the summer, there were clubs ready to pay €100m to sign me and I would have earned a lot more.

“Neymar, he could have earned as much with Manchester City or Chelsea. He didn’t sign here for the money but the project. It’s the same with me.”

Veratti also changed his agent during the transfer period as he replaced his former agent Donato Di Campli with super-agent Mino Raiola which speculated the transfer activity more.

But Verratti claimed the situation was really complicated for some time and the decision was purely personal however later everything becomes crystal clear with the French club's future plans.

“It was really complicated,” he said. “I didn’t expect a summer like that. A lot of things happened that I did not like, among them people from my side. They thought of themselves and not me. I never told PSG: 'I want to leave.’ I wasn’t sure if we were a team with very big ambitions.

“When new sporting director Antero Henrique arrived, the first thing I did was shorten my holidays to speak to him. As soon as we had our first talk, I told him: 'It’s good, I’ll stay here.’

“I didn’t stay because Neymar and Mbappe arrived – at that time I didn’t even know they were going to sign.”