Barcelona hold meetings with Lenglet

Directors from the club invited the French defenders agents to Barcelona to discuss him moving to Camp Nou this summer

Barcelona are taking giant steps in their attempts to sign Sevilla defender Clement Lenglet. Barça’s coach Ernesto Valverde last week reached a consensus with sporting director Robert Fernandez over the defender and have chosen him as the man to strengthen the team’s defence for next season  (as Sport revealed on Monday) and today we can reveal that a very important step has been taken in the last few hours towards Lenglet becoming a Blaugrana player in the summer.

This week there was a key meeting in Barcelona between Barça head honchos and the player’s agents to try and find out what the future transfer would entail.

Barcelona believe Lenglet has all the conditions to play at the heart of their defence. He is comfortable on the ball, he is good in the air and is a good defender, attributes which have convinced the club to try and sign him.

Lenglet, who is yet to turn 23, has had a good season at Sevilla and has showed he is good enough to play at the elite level of European football. This is part of what makes Barça so attracted to him because they want a player for the present and the future as they are aware of the problems with the defence as Samuel Umtiti could leave, Gerard Pique is 31, Vermaelen is 33 and Yerry Mina has not yet settled into the team.

At the end of the meeting Barça felt very confident that they will sign Lenglet because he is very keen to come. Before he was concerned that he would not play much but now he is convinced he could fight for a place in the team, something which is crucial to the player.