Barcelona working to stop Haaland from joining Madrid
Laporta has centred much of his strategy to sign Haaland around building a relationship with Mino Raiola.
Barcelona President Joan Laporta is working with a very clear plan ahead of the summer transfer window, as he wants to sign Erling Haaland for Barcelona and make the Norwegian forward the flagship player for his new Blaugrana.
The president of the Catalan club is willing to bet the farm, so to speak, in his attempt to sign Haaland from Borussia Dortmund and land a blow to Real Madrid's own summer plans in the same motion.
Competition for the goalscorer will be vast, of that there is no doubt in Laporta's mind, with Manchester City another club being linked.
Laporta has centred much of his strategy to sign Haaland around building a relationship with Mino Raiola.
Just a few days ago, Laporta was seen in Monaco with the Dutch agent and now L'Esportiu have reported that further developments have taken place, with Xavi Hernandez having met Haaland in Munich this week.
Information in the aforementioned story also suggested that Laporta's advisor Jordi Cruyff was also at the meeting involving Xavi and Haaland.
This, however, is likely not true, with MARCA understanding that Cruyff was actually in London to try and speed up the process of signing Andreas Christensen from Chelsea, so he wouldn't have been able to be present at that meeting.
Meanwhile, Barcelona sources haven't confirmed or denied if Xavi went to Munich to meet the player.
Florentino Perez's desire to pair Kylian Mbappe and Haaland at the Estadio Santiago Bernabeu next season is the stuff of absolute nightmares for Barcelona and Laporta.
The Blaugrana president simply can't allow it to happen, for prestige and for sporting reasons.
In terms of finances, Barcelona's money worries haven't disappeared and the Cules are acutely aware that they will need an injection of cash to sign Haaland.
This is why they are now more open to negotiating with the CVC fund, and progress in those talks are allowing Laporta to be moderately confident, but there are still many roads still to walk.
