Barcelona clear the most important hurdle to signing Nico Williams

Last summer, Barcelona pushed hard to sign Nico Williams to join their attack and fill a key vacancy on the left wing, with Spanish national teammate Lamine Yamal pushing hard for the move after their successful capture of the European Championship together on opposite wings.

But the deal fell through, because Nico didn’t want to leave Athletic Club for Barcelona, and the LaLiga underdogs were willing to increase his wages, which essentially put the kibosh on any sort of transfer.

This summer, all the same Premier League clubs that were after Williams last year – London rivals Chelsea and Arsenal, specifically – are still involved in the race. Lately, Barcelona have ramped up their interest, and now Bayern Munich are involved, too.

It looks like Barcelona are the favorites again, though, because now that it seems like Williams really could leave Bilbao in 2025, the Blaugrana have a leg up on the others.

Nico Williams wants to go to Barcelona

According to a report from Foot Mercato’s Santi Aouna, Barcelona sporting director Deco recently met with the agent of Williams, and the player is now willing to accept the salary Barca offered him last year of 12 million euros gross per season, which should work out to 6.5 million euros net.

Per Aouna, Williams is “very keen” to join Barcelona, and so if Nico is willing to accept the salary demands from last year that are still valid this year, then there’s pretty much no discussion here.

It seems very likely that Williams is going to be a Barcelona player next season. It’s the only move he’s truly seemed to want that could possibly coax him out of Athletic Club, which is a club he loves and a club where he can pair up with his brother Inaki Williams.

But there’s a ceiling to what he can achieve there vs. Barcelona, where he can also work with a player who is close to him in best friend Yamal, fresh off a season in which he established himself as the world’s best player.

Signing Williams would set up an interesting situation for Hansi Flick, since he already had the best winger duo in the world last season, as both Raphinha in his new position on the left wing and Yamal are legitimate Ballon d’Or favorites alongside Champions League winner Ousmane Dembele – a former Barcelona starting winger.

The next step for Barcelona will be ironing out a deal with Athletic Club, which should be pretty simple; it’s pay the 58 million euro release clause or walk away empty-handed.