News about Samuel Umtiti

Barcelona is set to cut four first team players' from their squad before heading to America for their pre-season tour next week. Samuel Umtiti is the only player to leave the club so far after being told his deal was terminated three years early, but Barca's financial situation means they are able to reduce the wage bill by selling more fringe players. According to Diario AS' reports, Xavi's side is still trying to move Clement Lenglet, Alex Collado, Franck Kessie, and Sergino Dest before heading to the United States next Wednesday.

The 2018 World Cup champion, 29, spent most of the season on loan at Lecce, finishing 16th in Serie A. With Barcelona's goal to minimize their wage bill to make room for new recruits, the move to break ties with a fringe celebrity seems financially motivated. It's been a difficult few years for the center-back, who has been dogged by injury and perseverance, with just 50 appearances for La Blaugrana since 2018.

According to reports, Barcelona is in the middle of a tumultuous summer after winning LaLiga, as they plan to negotiate the futures of six players. Despite the financial difficulties that continue to plague them, Xavi's team lifted the Spanish title after finishing ten points ahead of Real Madrid in the top-flight. However, the club will need to raise funds in order to balance their books in the event that they continue recruiting.

On Matchday 30 of Italy's biggest clubs, ALVISE CAGNAZZO: On Weekend 30 of the Serie A season, it was a frustrating weekend for some of Italy's top teams. Napoli, AC Milan, and Inter Milan were among those keeping an eye on the second leg of their Champions League quarter-finals this week, which may have resulted in points deferred. Rivals Roma and Lazio, on the other hand, lifted their hopes of Champions League qualification by 3-0 victories over Udinese and Spezia respectively. Alvise Cagnazzo of Mail Sport has dissected the weekend's events and taken a closer look at ten things we learned from the Italian top flight.

ALVISE CAGNAZZO: It was another action-packed weekend in Italy as Serie A saw many more twists and turns. Spezia, a Minnows Spezia, dealt Inter Milan a devastating blow to their potential titles, Napoli extending their advantage, and Juventus riot against Sampdoria. Sportsmail delves into Serie A's weekend action, giving you ten things we've learned.

With more games in store on Monday and Tuesday, the full round of fixtures has yet to conclude, but Italy's Serie A Serie A evoked up plenty of talking points over the weekend. Inter Milan defeated Arch-rivals AC Milan on Sunday night, with Lautaro Martinez turning home the only goal of the game at the San Siro, while Napoli defended their 13-point lead at the top with a three-goal victory over Spezia. ALVISE CAGNAZZO of Sportsmail has dissected the weekend's coverage and taken a closer look at ten things we learned from the Italian top flight.

After Lecce defender Samuel Umtiti and teammate Lameck Banda were raped with racial violence during their home game against Lazio on Wednesday, FIFA President Gianni Infantino ordered fans to'shut up all the racists.' According to Italian newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport, the game was postponed for several minutes after an announcement was made in the stadium requesting that the chanting be stopped. Home fans chanted Umtiti's name to drown out the racial abuse, and Lecce president Saverio Sticchi Damiani said the French World Cup winner, who is on loan from Barcelona, had requested for the game to resume.

Serie A is finally back! There has been no top-flight action in Italy since November 13, with a long break for the World Cup and the festive season. Fortunately for those with Calcio withdrawal symptoms, the game is back in a big dollop on Wednesday, with a full slate of ten Serie A games distributed fairly throughout the day. ALVISE CAGNAZZO provides us with the state of play at all 20 of the clubs ahead of its return.

The 13th matchday of the Serie A season and the penultimate weekend of action before the World Cup break were full of anticipation. Lazio won the local bragging rights in the derby with Roma, Juventus dominated Inter Milan 2-0, and Napoli defeated Atalanta to keep their unbeaten streak going. ALVISE CAGNAZZO of Sportsmail is back with the main talking points from another packed weekend in Italy.

After the defender's surprise retirement from football, Barcelona has been chastised for their treatment of Gerard Pique. On Saturday, the 35-year-old announced that he would play his final game of his glittering career against Almeria at the Nou Camp. However, the club's desire to usher him out the door in the hopes of avoiding the need to pay off his contract.

Barcelona is set to add more signings to their squad ahead of this week's transfer deadline, with a potential £48 million more to invest on new faces. Marcos Alonso (top right) and Manchester City midfielder Bernardo Silva (bottom right) are among the long list of wanted players to add to Chelsea's (centre) squad. They could offload the likes of Memphis Depay (top left) and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (bottom right) to free up more funds.

Barcelona has now been able to announce Jules Kounde as a member of their summer squad for the 2022-23 season. According to a story in The Athletic, Xavi's guys will be able to register in the summer for their match against Real Valladolid on Sunday. Barcelona pipped Chelsea for the defender, and was the last player to be admitted to the club after being refused to be included in the La Liga squad.

Fans and media were enthusiastically about the Frenchman's potential to return to form after losing a significant portion of the last few seasons in Catalonia on the hospital bed. When Umtiti first arrived Barcelona, he was considered one of the best young defenders in the world, having been voted in the UEFA Champions League Breakthrough XI during his first season with the club.

Pep Guardiola, a professional, returns to the Nou Camp on Wednesday evening as Man City faces Barcelona in a friendly. It will be the first time the City manager has supervised at his former club after a 2016 Champions League group stage tie, where a Lionel Messi hat trick boosted the Catalan giants to a 4-0 win. The game starts at 8.30 p.m. UK time and will feature Barcelona transfer target Bernardo Silva for the visitors, but it will be interesting to see what kind of reception the Portuguese playmaker gets.

Samuel Umtiti, a center back for Barcelona, is set to move to Lecce on a loan, but his parent club will continue to pay his salary in full. Fans of Barcelona will be shocked when it comes as the object of selling players was supposed to reduce the wage bill. Barca hasn't confirmed new signing Jules Kounde, who arrived from Sevilla for £46 million this summer.

In order to raise the '£17 million required to confirm new signing Jules Kounde, Xavi's Barcelona side is 'desperate to offload players.' Kounde is the only one of the Catalan Giants' summer signings that has yet to be confirmed, and he has skipped the club's first two league games after signing for £46 million from Sevilla.

Jules Kounde has yet to register for Barcelona in LaLiga and will miss their ride to Real Sociedad on Sunday night. In an agreement worth £46 million, the Catalan giants put off competition from Chelsea in order to secure the transfer of Kounde from Sevilla last month. However, Kounde is still not able to make his competitive debut for the club, with Xavi's team yet to register him in their domestic league.

According to Spanish outlet Sport, the Catalan giants are desperate to get rid of Braithwaite (left), and after their attempts to sell the player seeming to have failed, they are now considering alternative options. Braithwaite has made it abundantly clear that he will not leave with two years remaining on his current contract. The club has no other choice but to rescind his deal. Barca had promised him the opportunity to leave free alongside the likes of fellow outcasts Neto, Oscar Mingueza, and Samuel Umtiti, but the Danish forward's lack of cooperation has sour his relationship with the club, its manager Xavi (right) and its president Joan Laporta (inset).

PETE JENSON IN SPAIN: The question being asked on Monday morning by some Barcelona supporters was: just how many players do we need to sign before we can beat Rayo Vallecano, a team that won only three times away last season? Xavi is confident Bernardo Silva will transform his team from a longshot to favorite, and after watching Saturday's league opener, he feels more strongly than ever that the team must sign a new right back. The plate spinning is expected to continue until 00.01 a.m. on September the first. If Barcelona makes it to the end of the month with Alonso, Silva, and a new right back, then Xavi will be content, almost as long as it takes to make it happen.

Three of Barcelona's 17 registered players are without a squad number ahead of their LaLiga debut, which begins tomorrow. The Catalan club has so far been unable to gain £145 million in new signings in Robert Lewandowski, Raphinha, Jules Kounde, Frank Kessie, and Andreas Christensen, that the Spanish league has requested that the club raise around £85 million before Saturday's league opener against Rayo Vallecano to add these players. Such is the dire financial situation at the Nou Camp that Ousmane Dembele and Sergi Roberto, who both signed new contracts this summer, are also unable to be registered despite playing for Xavi's team last season due to LaLiga's tight salary cap laws.

LEWIS STEELE: Football's biggest club, which has a whopping £1.14 billion in debt, is crumbling. And, with just two days until Barcelona's season, the club is unlikely to announce their five summer signings by La Liga - about £140 million. Yes, you read it correctly: A club with a more than £1 billion loss has made a trolley dash to invest more than any other team in Europe, with players like Robert Lewandowski (centre, with Bayern Munich President Joan Laporta) in the United States. How did a club steeped in such a rich history get to the precipice of extinction?And why have they seemingly decided that the way out of the crisis is to spend, spend, spend? The club paid Lionel Messi (top right) more than £460 million over the four years since his last contract extension in 2017. The team, which has motto is mes que un club, became more like Messi's Club as his salary tripled in ten years. In truth, the club's demise started long before Messi's tearful departure. There's been a mention of the £198 million sale of Neymar in 2017, which also went to PSG. They invested the money on Ousmane Dembele and Philippe Coutinho (bottom right), both relative flops. Xavi (left), who was integral to Pep Guardiola's great staff from 2008 to 2012, is doing a fine job. He took over with the club in ninth and led them to runners-up. Now the club must launch Operation Salida, a scheme in which fringe players are sold in order to free up wages.