The Dutch legend questioned Barcelona’s summer transfer moves.
Former Barcelona player and coach Johan Cruyff has revealed his surprise that the club, which he is still heavily involved in, failed to sign Toni Kroos from Bayern Munich in the summer.
The German midfielder apparently had a deal in place with Barcelona, but the transfer was never completed, and Kroos moved to Barcelona’s bitter rivals Real Madrid instead.
“I can’t understand it,” the Dutchman is quoted as saying in Marca. “I know that Kroos had an affinity for Barcelona and could have gone there. I don’t know what happened, but he definitely liked the club.”
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Suggestions in the summer were that Kroos’ coach at Bayern, Pep Guardiola, told the player to move to Barcelona once he knew he was on the way out. For whatever reason, the deal didn’t work out, and the German playmaker ended up in Madrid, while Barcelona opted for Croatian Ivan Rakitic instead.
The World Cup winning playmaker would seem better suited to Barcelona’s style than Real Madrid’s. With Xavi being gradually retired, Kroos would have been the perfect player to replace him in the long term; and indeed the stats from the first ten games of La Liga this year show Xavi is the only player in the league with better pass completion stats than the German.