{"id":71123,"date":"2026-08-16T08:05:16","date_gmt":"2026-08-16T08:05:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/71123\/"},"modified":"2026-08-16T08:05:16","modified_gmt":"2026-08-16T08:05:16","slug":"a-free-transfer-a-new-development-brings-cancelo-closer-to-barcelona","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/71123\/","title":{"rendered":"A free transfer: a new development brings Cancelo closer to Barcelona"},"content":{"rendered":"

Al-Hilal’s Jo\u00e3o Cancelo has edged closer to a return to Barcelona, with the Portugal international posting a message across his social media accounts that carried a clear nod to the Catalan club.<\/p>\n

The 32-year-old shared a picture of himself from behind in a Barcelona shirt, an hourglass placed beside it. The message was obvious: his return to the Spotify Camp Nou is only a matter of time.<\/p>\n

Barcelona struck a deal with Al-Hilal weeks ago for the full-back at 10 million euros, though Saudi media reported in recent days that the club’s demands had climbed to 15 million.<\/p>\n

Spanish newspaper “Mundo Deportivo” revealed<\/a> that Cancelo will join Barcelona for free, with Al-Hilal signing Marc Casad\u00f3 in return. Casad\u00f3 has fallen out of Hansi Flick’s plans, and the fee sits below 40 million euros, the valuation the Catalan club had been chasing for the player.<\/p>\n

Inzaghi left Cancelo out of Al-Hilal’s opening match against Al-Faisaly last Friday, though the coach insisted the player “continues to train routinely with the team”.<\/p>\n

The Italian added: “As for his future and his continuation, this is a matter for the management.”<\/p>\n

Al-Hilal carry 13 foreign players in their squad. The regulations allow just 10 to be registered per team.<\/p>\n

Impressed by Cancelo’s form during his loan spell last season, after he joined Barcelona from Al-Hilal in the second half of the campaign, Flick has given the sporting management the green light to sign the versatile Portuguese permanently.<\/p>\n

Barcelona and Cancelo have wrapped up their agreement in full. All that remains is Al-Hilal’s approval to finalise the deal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Al-Hilal’s Jo\u00e3o Cancelo has edged closer to a return to Barcelona, with the Portugal international posting a message…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":71124,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[182,92,186,24127,85,1887,1888,265],"class_list":["post-71123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-barcelona","tag-al-hilal","tag-barcelona","tag-h-flick","tag-j-cancelo","tag-laliga","tag-m-casado","tag-saudi-pro-league","tag-transfers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71123"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71123\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}