I agree in principle except that they're not going to California, they're going to Los Angeles de San Rafael, some 60 km north west of Madrid for their traditional start of pre-season.
I am aware of that but I read a while ago that they are about to depart for the US in less than 1 week to play in that friendly tournament. Don't recall the name of that. Could be wrong though.
Regardless, as written, there is no purpose whatsoever for Griezmann to risk an injury by joining the Atlético training. It would be baseless for all 3 parties involved. He has no future at the club and Atlético cannot risk selling an injured (potentially seriously in case of bad luck) Griezmann.
The deal is literally hours from being finalized and made official. The board (despite my open dislike for them) have done nothing wrong here. They tried to make a deal with Atlético that would allow them not to pay the full transfer in one installment but it appears that they have failed at doing that since we don't want to include Semedo in the deal. Whatever is going on between Griezmann and Atlético (broken promises, accusations etc.) is not really the club's business.
Yeah. But all that is Griezmann camp talk. In other words, hearsay.
Since i will not believe in any party, be it Atletico, Griezmann or Barcelona, the only thing i can reliably rely on is the contract. Griezmann is an Atletico player until someone has agreed a fee with his club or the player has bought out his contract via his clause. So far, none of that has been done and he should respect his contract. No if or but.
And i'm not saying that because of Griezmann, Atletico or Barcelona. I have the exact same stance for Pogba, MU, Juve/Real Madrid. And i would have the same stance if Neymar or Mbappé try to do the same thing.
Rodri and City did it the proper way. Pay the release clause before it can lead to such troubles !
Griezmann has every right to not show up to a training session (deliberately) even if he remains (as of now) an Atlético player. He will just have to live with the consequences and the only such consequence will be a very tiny fine (for his income). That is if Griezmann and Atlético cannot come to terms by making a deal and stop acting like children.
If that tiny fine potentially prevents him from suffering a serious injury that will ruin his immediate and long-term future (potentially), I think he can live with that until we buy him (as rumored) either tomorrow or on Tuesday.
Why are we activating his clause just after a couple of days of A. Madrid's first training session? Why are we going through unnecessary inconvenience?
We know that Griezmann is going to Barca since his announcement. We are handling this transfer very very poorly.
This is completely normal when negotiations between both clubs have taken place. Neither Bayern nor Man City had any discussions with Atlético (that we know of) of alternative deals, players being included in the deal etc. so they simply paid the release clause after having informed Atlético of their interest a long time in advance much like Atlético (apparently) knew that Griezmann would be gone this summer months ago.