Barcelona are keen to improve relations with Frenkie de Jong, following the trickiest spell between player and club since the Dutchman arrived.
After intense speculation that Barcelona were keen to sell him during the summer, de Jong publicly called out the club for the pressure put on him in the media before the World Cup.
Jordi Cruyff, Joan Laporta and others have protested their innocence publicly since. However there has still been a consistent push for talks with de Jong to reduce his salary, which they feel is disproportionate to the market and the squad.
As per Sport, Barcelona are giving up on that strategy. Aware that Sergio Busquets is likely to leave the club this summer, it has become clear to them that it will be a struggle for them to find a replacement on the market with their limited resources. The result is that Barcelona are now keen to hold onto de Jong at all costs and will stop any pressure for a salary reduction in order to improve relations with the player.
It may well be that they simply realised de Jong would not be shifting on his stance. Either way, they have arguably damaged the relationship with de Jong irrevocably at this point. The cynic might say that Barcelona are simply cleansing their public image in order to show themselves in a better light.
