Flick would rather accept €18m-rated Barcelona star’s January exit over Ronald Araujo | OneFootball

Amidst all the joy and pleasure of FC Barcelona winning their first trophy of the season, the future of key defender and one of the club captains, Ronald Araujo, continues to be shrouded in uncertainty.

The 25-year-old centre-half is said to be keen on securing a departure this month with Juventus pushing hard to sign him.

Barça manager Hansi Flick, on the other hand, intends to retain the defender, whom he recently called one of the best in the world.

Flick would accept Eric Garcia’s exit over Araujo

As reported just a while ago, the injury to Inigo Martinez could change things as far as Ronald Araujo’s situation is concerned as the manager will need all his resources.

But if it comes to the situation where Barça would need to offload a player, given that they need to free up salary space to sign a new forward like Marcus Rashford, the manager would rather accept Eric Garcia’s exit over Araujo’s.

Araujo ahead of Eric Garcia in Flick’s pecking order. (Photo by Eric Alonso/Getty Images)

This is according to AS, who claim that the German tactician has never hidden that Araujo is ahead of Garcia in his order of preference.

As such, if it came down to it, Flick would prefer to see the 24-year-old Spanish defender leave over the Uruguayan international.

Garcia, for his part, is attracting strong interest from Girona, where he excelled on loan last season, with manager Michel keen on a reunion.

Ideally, the Barça manager would prefer to keep hold of his entire squad for a challenging second half of the season.

But if it comes down to one between Garcia and Araujo, Flick would rather retain the latter over the Spaniard.

*Player valuation in title obtained from transfermarkt.com on date of publication.