Erling Haaland’s agent confirms he can’t say no to Barcelona’ on €1bn move from Man City to La Liga

Erling Haa­land’s agent has joked about a future €1bn trans­fer, admit­ting he “can’t say no to Barcelona”.

The 22-year-old Nor­we­gian strik­er has tak­en the Pre­mier League by storm since join­ing Man­ches­ter City from Borus­sia Dort­mund last summer.

He has already scored 31 goals in 27 appear­ances for Cit­i­zen, mak­ing him one of the most watched strik­ers on the planet.

Haa­land and many oth­er foot­ball stars were shak­en by the death of super agent Mino Raio­la, aged 54, in May 2022.

But before the Ital­ian died, he asked his ally, Brazil­ian lawyer Rafaela Pimen­ta, to take over his business.

Today, she over­sees the inter­ests of Haa­land and the com­pa­nies that rep­re­sent it.

This week, she gave an inter­view to Span­ish pub­lish­er AS to talk about the star’s future, stress­ing that she and Raio­la have a good rela­tion­ship with Barcelona and pres­i­dent Joan Lapor­ta, and hopes for a future La Liga move. It seems that he could not help sug­gest­ing it.

“I always say Lapor­ta can’t ask for any­thing in foot­ball, it’s unfair,” Pimen­ta said. “Because he knows I say yes.”

But he has put City fans at ease by claim­ing he is “mar­ried” to a club he has a con­tract with until 2027.

And he revealed that he believes the val­ue of Haa­land’s trans­fer will exceed the €1 bil­lion because there are many added val­ues such as fans, dig­i­tal con­tent, name recog­ni­tion, and sponsors.

Pre­men­ta added: “We know nobody pays play­ers €700million, but it’s clear that the val­ue that Erling adds when he comes to the club is immea­sur­able, at least €1bn. are there,” he said.

For 18 years, Pimen­ta has been Raio­la’s right-hand man, work­ing along­side him and learn­ing the ropes.

He was a key per­son in his busi­ness and a brain for advice.

In 1998, he helped found a small club in São Paulo, Guaratingue­ta, where they first met togeth­er with leg­endary Brazil­ian play­ers Rivar­do and César Sampaio.

At the time, she was also a uni­ver­si­ty pro­fes­sor of inter­na­tion­al law and was drawn into the world of football.

Before that, she was on the antitrust team set up by Brazil­ian Pres­i­dent Fer­nan­do Hen­rique Cardoso.

But a chance meet­ing between Pimen­ta and Raio­la was the begin­ning of a fruit­ful rela­tion­ship that would go on to work togeth­er for the next 18 years until his untime­ly death.