Julian Alvarez Barcelona talk refuses to die, and on Friday morning it took its most awkward turn yet. The Argentina international missed training at Atletico Madrid for a third consecutive day, four days before the transfer window shuts, and with his own club having already put out an official statement insisting they will not negotiate with the Blaugrana under any circumstances.
Two things are true at once. Atletico hold every contractual card, and Atletico have a forward who does not appear to want to be there. Between now and the deadline on Monday 31 August, one of those facts has to give.
Julian Alvarez Barcelona latest: a third day away from the group
Alvarez was absent again from the session at Atletico’s Cerro del Espino base in Majadahonda on Friday, according to reporter Belen Sanchez Garcia, cited by Barca Universal. That makes three sessions in a row.
The club’s explanation for the earlier absences was, per Mundo Deportivo, a single word: “indisposition”. That can cover a great deal. What it has not done is calm anything down, because Atletico host Sevilla on Saturday evening and their most valuable attacking asset has spent the build-up out of sight.
The backdrop is a supporter relationship that has already frayed. Alvarez was given a notably cold reception by his own crowd during Atletico’s league opener against Villarreal — a moment that told you rather more about where this stands than any club statement has.
The captains’ meeting that went nowhere
The most revealing detail of the week came from Catalan programme Jijantes, relayed by Mundo Deportivo. Alvarez, it was reported, went to Atletico’s captains — Koke, Jan Oblak and Jose Maria Gimenez — and asked them to help unblock his situation so that Barcelona could at least open negotiations.
Diego Simeone’s answer, according to the same report, closed the door politely but firmly. The head coach told the dressing room that there was nothing the players could do, that the position was a club matter and not one the squad could influence.
It is worth being precise about what that is and is not. It is a player using the only internal channel available to him. It is not, on the evidence reported, Barcelona going behind anybody’s back — a distinction that matters given how the week’s rhetoric has escalated.
Atletico’s statement, and the Apollo line
Atletico published a statement on their own website reinforcing that they will not sell Alvarez to Barcelona this summer. The notable addition, as Mundo Deportivo highlighted, was that the position now formally includes majority shareholder Apollo. In other words, this is no longer one executive’s view but the ownership’s.
That executive has hardly been quiet either. Chief executive Miguel Angel Gil Marin said he had been “disgusted” by what he called Barcelona’s “lack of ethics and professionalism” over the pursuit, and added that Alvarez was not doing well.
Barcelona’s reply came from sporting vice-president Rafa Yuste, speaking to Movistar and quoted by Barca Blaugranes. “What surprises me is that, knowing Gil Marin, he made these statements,” Yuste said. “It’s rude, disrespectful. I want to say that our president, our sporting department, the entire club, has been an example of hard work and professionalism for many years. These words cross a red line. I don’t understand them at all.”
Asked whether Barca had given up, he was deliberately vague. “The transfer window is closing in a few days, and that’s it. I feel terrible about this, truly. What I have to do is defend the club and the professionals, like Deco and Bojan. This is crossing a red line. We respect Atletico as an institution and all footballers in the world. If a player wants to come, we’re excited.” Our earlier piece has the full Yuste response to Gil Marin’s red line.
The two men, incidentally, ended up in the same building on Wednesday night: the Champions League draw in Monte Carlo, where the mixed zone became the venue for the row. Mundo Deportivo described the atmosphere between the clubs afterwards as maximum tension.
Why Barcelona have not walked away
From the outside, persisting looks close to irrational. Alvarez is 26, under a long contract, and the selling club has publicly ruled out the sale more than once in a week. Barca’s reported offer has already been dismissed — we covered Barcelona’s approach and Atletico’s zero-percent verdict earlier in the window.
The internal logic is that a player who does not want to stay is a depreciating asset, and that a club four days from a deadline with no replacement lined up eventually has to weigh the cost of an unhappy star against the price of a clean break. That is the bet. It may well be a losing one.
Arsenal remain the other interested party, though it has been reported that Alvarez has no appetite for a return to the Premier League. If that holds, Atletico’s alternative to selling to Barcelona is not selling to anybody — which is precisely the outcome they have said they want.
Joan Laporta has kept the file open publicly, insisting on the signing while extending a hand to Atletico. Mundo Deportivo’s Achraf Ben Ayad read the president’s positioning as doing two jobs at once: signalling to supporters that there would be no low-cost stopgap at number nine, and keeping the Alvarez story alive through to Tuesday, when the usual off-the-record briefing that the squad is closed tends to arrive.
The awkward truth: Barca have been fine without him
The strongest argument against the whole operation is the football Barcelona have played while it has been going on.
Robert Lewandowski left for Chicago Fire this summer and Ferran Torres joined PSG, which is why the number nine question has dominated the window. Hansi Flick’s answer so far has been to not really have one. Raphinha led the line as a false nine against Athletic Club on Thursday and scored, and the captain and Fermin Lopez have six goals between them in two matchdays. Our write-up covers Raphinha’s case for keeping the number nine role.
Flick, for his part, declined to commit after the win. “We don’t know. For this match, yes,” he said of Raphinha through the middle, in comments carried by Barca Universal. “For me, it’s important that when we have Raphinha or any other number 9, we can stick to our game plan.”
Behind that, Barca have two wins, two clean sheets and top spot after two rounds — a start detailed in our look at Flick’s first perfect defensive opening. And the signing that genuinely reset the summer’s mood was not a striker at all. Rodri’s arrival from Manchester City, and his debut ovation on Thursday, did more for the sense that this window has been a success than any late number nine could.
Ben Ayad made that point sharply in Mundo Deportivo: before Rodri, the pursuit of Alvarez was pure obsession, and the phrase “terrible Barca window” was pre-loaded on social media in case nobody arrived. After Rodri, supporters signed off on the club’s work, with only the familiar footnote — a shame about the striker.
What happens between now and Monday
The window closes on Monday 31 August, the same evening Barcelona host Rayo Vallecano at the Spotify Camp Nou. Atletico play Sevilla on Saturday, and whether Alvarez is in that squad will say more than any statement from either boardroom.
Barcelona’s Champions League league phase, meanwhile, has already handed them Manchester City and PSG among their eight opponents — the full list is in our guide to Barca’s confirmed 2026/27 European fixtures. That campaign starts on 8 September, by which point this will either be a signing or a story.
The likeliest ending remains the quiet one: the deadline passes, Atletico keep a player who does not want to be kept, and Barcelona go into the season with Raphinha, Anthony Gordon and Karim Adeyemi sharing the load through the middle. But a forward who has missed three straight training sessions is not a situation that resolves itself on 1 September. Whatever happens on Monday, somebody will still have to manage the aftermath.
Sources: Barca Universal, Mundo Deportivo and Barca Blaugranes.
