Barcelona bound? Sevilla remove star defender’s shirt from official store

As per confirmed reports by Alvaro Munoz Gomez, Sevilla have officially removed the shirt of Barcelona transfer target Jules Kounde from their stores. The report states that Los Nervionenses have stopped the production and sale of jerseys with the his name and number.

The report also comes with a verified photo of the stadium store, where the jerseys of the players are hung sequentially, with Kounde’s jersey number 23 missing from the sequence. This may suggest that the defender is definitely on his way out of Sevilla.

This was also backed up by Sevilla manager Julen Lopetegui during his pre-season press conference, where he stated that Kounde is one of the players that could leave the club during the summer transfer season.

The Spaniard was quoted as saying (h/t COPE): “We’ve had an important player leave, in Diego Carlos, and our other starting centre-back [Kounde] could leave as well, we don’t know what’s going to happen.

The French centre-back has had several links throughout the summer, with Chelsea FC and FC Barcelona being the front runners throughout. He has, however, according to multiple reports, been gravitating towards staying in Spain.

Barça have been looking to sign another centre-back, to slot in alongside Ronald Araujo despite the recent signing of Andreas Christensen from Chelsea. The Catalans seem to want a ball-playing yet enforcing centre-back, due to Christensen’s lack of physicality.

Barça have been on a mission to revolutionize their defence ahead of the 2022/23 season, making attempts to move on the likes of Samuel Umtiti, Oscar Mingueza, after the successful outgoings of Dani Alves and Clement Lenglet.

The Catalans also seemingly have a few more defensive signings in mind, such as Chelsea skipper Cesar Azpilicueta.

Kounde has been a top target for the Blaugrana and an agreement over personal terms with the club is already said to be in place. With Sevilla dropping a huge hint that the Frenchman will be on his way out, a move to Barcelona may be inching closer.