Manchester City respond to Barcelona enquiry over Bernardo Silva

Manchester City have no intention of allowing Bernardo Silva to leave the club before the January transfer deadline.

Silva has been a key player for City throughout most of his time at the club, wining four Premier League titles, an FA Cup, four League Cups and playing in a Champions League final since he arrived from Monaco for £43.5m in the summer of 2017.

But, while happy in a footballing sense, the Portugal international has been unsettled off the pitch for a considerable time. He first began ‘feeling along’ during the UK’s first Covid-19 lockdown in 2020 and later asked to leave the club altogether in the summer of 2021.

He has been at the centre of a number of high-profile transfer sagas in recent windows, most recently coming last summer, when the former AS Monaco man was linked with a switch to La Liga giants FC Barcelona.

Pep Guardiola admitted last year that Silva ‘likes Barcelona a lot’ and wouldn’t stand in his way if the player wanted to leave, despite stressing that he wants to keep him. The club took a firmer stance.

Barcelona have checked on Silva’s situation, stopping short of any sort of official approach, but City have said he is going nowhere in the hours that remain of this month.

According to Ben Ransom of Sky Sports, Bernardo Silva will be staying at Manchester City beyond transfer deadline day and for the remainder of the season, with there being no possibility of him leaving the club at this stage in the window.

Whether or not this is a long-term solution to some of Pep Guardiola’s problems seen in recent weeks, only time will tell.