Barcelona director of football Mateu Alemany has confirmed Ousmane Dembele is set to leave the club immediately after he refused to sign a contract extension.
The Frenchman has been left out of the Blaugrana’s squad set to face Athletic Club in the Copa del Rey later on Thursday night.
Speaking on Thursday, Alemany suggested the winger was not willing to sign fresh terms, leaving them with no choice but to sanction his sale during the current January transfer as the winger’s contract runs out in the summer.
“With Ousmane and his agents we started conversations around the month of July.
“In all this time, almost seven months, we have talked, Barca has made different offers, we have tried to find a way for the player to continue with us and those offers have been continuously rejected by his agents.
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“It seems obvious to us that the player does not want to continue at Barcelona and is not committed to Barca’s future project.
“We told him and his agents that he must leave the club immediately because we want to have players committed to the project.
“We expect a transfer to take place before January 31. The sporting consequence is that we don’t want to have players who don’t want to be at Barca.
“The fact that he was not in the [squad] list for today is the consequence of this whole process. The coach has our full support, it’s a consistent attitude.”
This comes a day after coach Xavi Hernandez told the former Borussia Dortmund to either sign fresh terms or he will be sold.
