Although everything indicates that Nico Williams will wear the shirt of FC Barcelona for the 2025/26 season, his current team, Athletic Club de Bilbao, is reluctant to accept the idea of losing its top figure in attack.
In a new desperate move, the 'rojiblanco' team began to promote their new shirt in a photo where the Pamplona native appeared during the last match for LaLiga, which coincidentally was against Barça at San Mamés, where they ended up being defeated by the Blaugrana with a score of 0-3.
After a few hours, the official website of Athletic Club stopped showing the player with the team's new kit. Therefore, this could be due to an error or because the player has asked to be removed from the promotion.
In this order of ideas, Yuri Berchiche is one of the models of the first kit, while Maroan Sannadi appears with the second shirt and Unai Simón with the goalkeeper's shirt, but no trace of Nico.
However, when entering to buy any shirt, the website allows you to choose the option "Williams Jr." to sell the left winger's shirt.
Athletic is willing not to let Nico leave
Athletic Club de Bilbao is doing everything possible to stall the possible signing of Nico Williams by Barça. From the 'rojiblanco' team they practically went on to see the Blaugrana as an 'enemy' for wanting to acquire the services of the '10'.
In this context, the movements of 'the lions' to hinder the operation range from the presentation of their president, Jon Uriarte, at the headquarters of LaLiga to know the capacity of Barça to incorporate players to wanting to make a thorough audit of the economic operations of the Catalan team.
To all this is added this attempt to pressure the player to desist from his idea of wanting to wear the Blaugrana shirt, because from the first moment that rumors began to link the player with Barça, Athletic Club would have seen this as an attack.
Nico Williams' desire is clear: he only wants to play for Barça
Apparently, the Basque team knows firsthand from the player that he only wants to wear the Blaugrana shirt, something that would not have pleased much in the sports management.
In this sense, Barcelona has to pay the player's termination clause, which is €58M plus an additional 4 for CPI adjustments, making a total of 62 'kilos'. Also, according to the latest rumors, the payment of this would soon be finalized by Barça, with whom the player already has an agreement.
'The lions' would prefer that the '10' go to another team, such as Bayern Munich, which according to journalist Florian Plettenberg would offer the '17' of 'La Roja' a net salary of 12 million euros, placing him as the second highest paid of the Bavarians, according to the web portal Capology, since the first is Harry Kane with €13.2M.