This article is part of Football FanCast’s Transfer Focus series, which provides opinion and analysis on recent transfer news…

Barcelona had quite an interesting transfer window in the summer and despite their failure to land Neymar, some pretty interesting and high-profile names have joined the squad.

But if the reports from Mundo Deportivo are true, Blaugrana had a chance to get a Juventus ace in exchange for one of their own but they refused the deal.

That just might have been a good call.

What’s the word, then?

There was a lot of talk of Ivan Rakitic potentially leaving Barcelona this summer. At first, he was reportedly set to be used as a makeweight in a potential deal for Neymar, who was one of Barcelona’s main targets over the course of the transfer window.

But then, when that failed, Juventus came into the fold and started asking about the Croatian, and this is reportedly still ongoing as the two sides could yet reach an agreement in January.

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But according to the Catalan sources, the Old Lady also tried convincing Blaugrana by offering one of their own players, Federico Bernardeschi, but they also asked for a sum of €23m (£20.6m) in addition to Rakitic’s services.

By the looks of it, regardless of the fact that Barcelona would be getting a younger player in return, that does seem like a bullet dodged by the Catalans.

A bad deal

It is true that Barcelona are currently a bit thin in the forward line of their squad. With all three of Lionel Messi, Luis Suarez and Ousmane Dembele sidelined with various injuries, it would not be a stretch to say that reinforcements would be welcomed. But they also have to think about the quality of the players they would be bringing in.

If the likes of Philippe Coutinho, Malcom or Rafinha, all of whom were discarded this summer, were not good enough to even make the bench, then Bernardeschi definitely won’t make the cut.

Just by looking at his stats and his status at Juventus in 2018/19, we can see that the 25-year-old played a somewhat supporting role in Turin as well.

He only started 14 games and came on as a sub in the other 14, averaging 1.9 shots per game, 1.2 key passes and only 83.1% passing accuracy, which is the crucial element in Barcelona’s gameplan that revolves around possession. Despite him being six years younger than Rakitic, the Croat’s influence on the team is still too strong for him to be discarded so easily.

The additional €23m (£20.6m) Juventus were requesting clearly made it a simple decision for the Barcelona bigwigs.

Looking at it from all angles, both financially and from a sporting perspective, it really wasn’t a deal that made much sense for Barcelona.

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