Huge Setback For Barcelona As Top Target's Club Demands A 9-Figure Transfer Fee: Report

Lautaro Martinez has been FC Barcelona’s top target, alongside Neymar, for a few months now. But it looks like they won’t be able to sign the striker this summer.

Martinez’s current club, Inter Milan, has clearly said that the player is not for sale and if a club is interested in signing him, they will have to match his release clause of $121 million, a nine-figure fee that Barcelona cannot afford in these tough financial times, which have emerged due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Barcelona, who are keen to sign Martinez, have even offered a few players as a swap deal to bring Lionel Messi’s countryman to Nou Camp, however, Inter Milan are being firm about the release clause.

“As far as Martinez is concerned, there is only one way that he will leave Inter and that is by paying his clause. A clause that everyone knows – there is no point in hiding – is demanding, because it has both deadlines and commitments that must be kept very precise."

"It is a clause that expires in the early part of July so it won't last for a long time. And it is the only possibility that exists to take Lautaro away from Inter today,” Inter Milan’s sporting director, Piero Ausilo, told Sky Italia in a recent interview.

Martinez has scored 16 goals in 31 matches this season as Inter Milan are currently placed third in Serie A table. The 22-year-old, who joined the Italian side ahead of the 2018-19 season, has overall scored 25 times for the club in as many as 66 appearances and is considered to be an “asset” of Inter Milan, according to their sporting director.

“He is an important asset of the club, and let's not forget that he still has a three-year contract with Inter. We are not going to sell their most important players. We intend to keep them and eventually strengthen in the transfer market, and this also applies to Lautaro,” Ausilo added in the interview.

Barcelona, who are struggling financially ahead of the upcoming transfer market, are understood to have offered Martinez a deal worth $11m per year.