Barca Tell Manchester City "Hands Off"

Manchester City have been told “hands off” by Barcelona president Sandro Rosell, but it isn’t Lionel Messi or Andres Iniesta are after, oh no, it’s Barca staff that City are after.

The Spanish giants are by far the most successful club in Europe over the past few seasons and Manchester City want to emulate their success and see the staff at the Nou Camp as the final piece of the jigsaw to make the Premier League champions the European Champions.

City recently brought director of football Txiki Begiristain and chief executive Ferran Soriano to The Etihad Stadium but Rosell says those two are not the only staff City are after, "Manchester City have indeed launched an offensive to lure a number of people away from Barcelona".

"We're talking about people at all levels of the Barca structure, not just players. Their attempts have been unsuccessful, though, as our employees are happy here.

"There have been contacts, but we have a fantastic group of people and nobody wants to go."

Rosell is hoping City’s former Barcelona employees won’t steal the Catalan club’s blueprint, "I had hoped that they would not use the information they gathered about Barcelona during his time here to help another club become bigger, but they seem to disagree with me.

"I would like it if the relationship between both clubs was a bit better and more transparent."

Sam Jewell