Barcelona ended their pre-season on Wednesday night with a 2-1 win over Al Ahly, a trophy on the table and a squad presented to a full-throated Spotify Camp Nou. They also ended it with the same hole in the middle of the front line that they have carried since June. Asked directly about it in the mixed zone, Hansi Flick did not hedge. The Barcelona No 9 search is live, it is Deco’s job, and the manager is comfortable with that.
Here is what this piece covers:
- Exactly what Flick and Deco said after the Joan Gamper Trophy — in full
- Why the Julian Alvarez deal collapsed, and who Barça pivoted to
- The Lautaro Martinez plan and the very large problem sitting in Milan
- The four alternative names on the list, and what each would cost
- The internal option Flick keeps talking about — and the registration deadline nobody is discussing
How Barça arrived at a squad with no recognised striker
The maths is brutally simple. Robert Lewandowski left for Chicago Fire and Ferran Torres was sold to Paris Saint-Germain for a reported €50m. Two centre-forwards out, none in. Deco spelled it out to TV3 after the Gamper, in comments carried by Barça Blaugranes: “We had the departure of two players up front, Lewandowski and Ferran. Ferran, I think we can have solutions with the additions we have made. Robert’s is much more difficult, it’s very difficult to replace a player like him. We have internal solutions. We’re working on it.”
For most of the window the plan had a name on it. Julian Alvarez was the target, and Barça pushed at that door repeatedly. It never opened. According to journalist Victor Navarro, cited by Barça Universal, Atletico Madrid CEO Miguel Angel Gil Marin vetoed any sale to Catalonia outright, and Diego Simeone said publicly this week that his striker is not going anywhere. We covered the moment that pursuit tipped over in our piece on the Julian Alvarez move being called 99% off. It is now, by every account in the Catalan press, dead.
What Flick and Deco actually said
Flick: “I trust him with my eyes closed”
The manager was brief, but he was unambiguous. “Yes, we are looking for this player [a 9]. Deco has done a fantastic job so far and I trust him with my eyes closed,” Flick told TV3, as reported by Mundo Deportivo. That is a manager publicly handing the file to his sporting director eleven days before the window shuts, and publicly backing him while he does it.
Flick also used the moment to praise Rodri, the €60m arrival from Manchester City who did not feature at the Gamper but drew the loudest ovation of the squad presentation. “He structures the team, is good with the ball at his feet and can decide when to play faster and when to play slower. That’s what we want from a player like that. He’s a leader on and off the field.” Our full breakdown of that deal is here: Rodri’s Barcelona transfer, made official.
Deco: “We’re almost certainly going to make a move”
Deco went a step further than Flick. Speaking to the same broadcaster, and quoted by Mundo Deportivo, he confirmed the club expects to do business: there are internal solutions, he said, but “we’re almost certainly going to make some move. It’s about finding the best solution. We’re working out what to do.” He declined to give a name.
He was also keen to shut down one narrative around Rodri: “We didn’t sign him to take him away from anyone. He’s a World Cup winner. Months ago we didn’t know he’d be available. We’re clear on what he can bring to the team.” Adeyemi, Gordon, Bisiwu, Cancelo and Rodri, he insisted, all “made sense”.
Why the Barcelona No 9 shortlist now starts with Lautaro Martinez
With Alvarez gone, one name has moved to the top. According to Jijantes, reported by Barça Blaugranes, and corroborated by Gerard Romero via Barça Universal, Inter captain Lautaro Martinez is now Barcelona’s outright No. 1 target for the closing days of the window.
The encouraging part, for Culers: Barça are said to have met the player’s representatives, and the reporting suggests his camp left the door open. The 28-year-old has been linked with the Blaugrana on and off for years without it ever getting close. This is the first time in a while that a meeting has actually happened.
The discouraging part is everything else. Martinez has spent roughly eight years at Inter, captains them, and signed an extension two years ago running to 2029. He has said in the past that he would like to retire at the San Siro. Inter are not a club that needs the money, and they are not going to sell their talisman with days left in the window without extracting a fee that would strain a Barça board only just back inside LaLiga’s 1:1 spending rule. Treat this one as ambition rather than imminence.
The four names behind him
Deco has not put all his chips on one number. Reports this week place four other forwards in the conversation, at wildly different price points.
- Nicolo Tresoldi (Club Brugge) — per Victor Navarro of COPE, via Barça Universal, the 21-year-old Germany U21 international is “very, very much liked” internally. He scored 23 goals with nine assists in his first season in Belgium and has three in three this term. Brugge reportedly want north of €40m.
- Georges Mikautadze (Villarreal) — Everything Barça call the Georgian Deco’s most realistic Plan B at roughly €60-65m, while noting Flick is not fully convinced he is ready to lead this attack.
- Viktor Gyökeres (Arsenal) — Barça Universal report the Swede is “offering himself daily” to the club. A move would depend on other dominoes falling in north London.
- Harry Kane (Bayern Munich) — Sports Mole say Barça are keeping a “close eye” on the England captain, who has 12 months left in Munich. The Daily Mail report he wants a new three-year deal there, which makes this the longest shot on the list.
The counter-argument: Barça might already have the answer
Not everyone inside the dressing room is treating this as a crisis. Eric Garcia, deputising as a captain at the Gamper and now being retrained at right-back, made the case for standing pat when Mundo Deportivo asked him about it.
“The two centre-forwards we had have gone. We are who we are, and I think we have plenty of alternatives up front,” he said. “Anthony [Gordon] can play there, Karim [Adeyemi], Rapha has played there, even Lamine. Hamza is doing very well. Luckily that’s the sporting director’s job and not mine. We accept what we have, which is already a lot. If someone comes, they’ll be welcome.”
Hamza Abdelkarim is the name that keeps surfacing. The 18-year-old finished pre-season as Barça’s top scorer with four goals, including the opener against his old club at the Gamper — a goal he pointedly refused to celebrate, as we wrote here. Flick was warm about him afterwards: “Hamza is a good striker. We can see it when he attacks crosses. Today I saw him holding the ball up, which is good. That’s what I want to see from him.”
Mundo Deportivo’s Santi Nolla made a related point in his column: with Raphinha, Gordon, Lamine Yamal and Adeyemi, this is a forward line with four genuinely elite wide options. The problem is specific, not general. Barça are short of one profile, not of attackers.
What happens next
Two deadlines now sit on top of each other. The first is administrative: Mundo Deportivo report that Barça — inside LaLiga’s 1:1 rule for the first time since 2020-21, after passing €1bn in revenue for 2025-26 — began processing the registrations of Gordon, Adeyemi, Rodri and Cancelo on Thursday, and expect all of them cleared for Sunday. Cancelo’s may be tight, given his signing had still not been announced. Jesse Bisiwu will be registered with the B team as planned.
The second is sporting. Barça open their LaLiga title defence away at Elche on Sunday night, and Flick was blunt about it: “Only a win will do on Sunday at Elche. They are playing well, but we have to be ready. I liked the team today; we have potential to improve.”
Expect the striker file to move quickly after that. Deco has promised “some move”, Flick has publicly endorsed him to make it, and there are only days of the window left. Whether that move is a €100m-plus swing at an Inter captain or a €40m bet on a 21-year-old in Belgium will tell you a great deal about how much financial room Barça genuinely have.
The bottom line
Barcelona are going into a title defence without a recognised centre-forward, and both the manager and the sporting director have now said out loud that they intend to fix it. Lautaro Martinez is the dream. Tresoldi and Mikautadze are the plans. Hamza Abdelkarim is the wildcard already in the building. Keep it locked to ReadBarcelona — we will have every twist of the Barcelona No 9 hunt between now and deadline day.
