Manchester City Star Defender Swap Deal With Barcelona Makes Complete Sense

There have been few players as ingrained in the recent renaissance of Manchester City as defender and captain Vincent Kompany.

Beloved by Cityzens everywhere and seemingly set to have a statue erected of him outside the Etihad sometime in the future, Kompany has been integral - both on the pitch and increasingly behind the scenes - to City’s three title successes in six years.

Kompany is now in his tenth season in the blue of Manchester but has had to sit back and enjoy the fireworks as Aymeric Laporte and John Stones have formed a brilliant centre-back pairing to record the best defensive record in the Premier League.

The 32-year-old obviously bleeds blue and there undoubtedly seems to be a post-playing career path with the City Group.

If the Belgian does feel evergreen however, La Liga champions Barcelona may well be his golden ticket, with The Mirror reporting that he is one of two players - alongside former Chelsea stalwart Branislav Ivanovic - the Blaugrana are interested in in bringing to the Nou Camp in January to rectify their defensive woes.

Barcelona’s backline has been perforated too many times to count this season, keeping just one clean sheet in their last seven games, and that coming in the Copa del Rey in a narrow 1-0 win against Segunda División side Cultural y Deportiva Leonesa.

You have to go back all the way to the end of August to find the last time Barcelona had a La Liga shutout.

It’s increasingly apparent that Gerard Pique is not the reliable, trustworthy player he once was, and Samuel Umtiti is now in Qatar for treatment on a knee injury and doesn’t look like returning to the fold anytime soon.

The Sportsman reported recently that Barca’s Spanish left-back Jordi Alba, 29, has entered the last 18 months of his contract and talks regarding an extension haven’t been forthcoming.

With Benjamin Mendy - who was bought from AS Monaco in summer 2017 to play in Alba’s position at Manchester City - once again out for the EPL champs with his second long-term injury in a year and both Fabian Delph and Oleksandr Zinchenko providing obvious weak points in a pretty much imperious XI whenever they take to the pitch, this may be the one deal that would appease City fans in letting their treasured ‘Komps’ go - for now at least.